tune to possess not only the published very margin of the sea, and terminating in intelligence of cur fellow-labourers in ridged, conical, or pyramidal summits; the the press, but some exceedingly curious dark rocks chequered with their burthens of purest snow; and the whole, viewed unoriginal documents from the rival Rus-der the density of a gloomy sky, forming a sian voyage of discovery now prosecut-grand and impressive picture. Its most remarkable inhabitant, the white or Polar bear, which also occurs on the ice, the ferocious, and apparently natural lord of those regions. He preys indiscriminately on quadruped, reptile, fowl, and fish; all behold him with dread, and flee his presence. The seals signify their fear of him by constant watching, and betake themselves precipitately to the water on his approach*. Carrion, therefore, (chiefly the carcass of the whale at a certain season) affords him a passive, sure, and favourite food. His sense of smelling is peculiarly acute; in raises his head, and snuffs the passing his march he frequently faces the breeze, scent, whereby he discovers the nearest route to his odorous banquet, though the distance be incredibly great. that the world should never end, that our 1st September. I went to Delft and Roterdam, and two days after back to the Hague, to bespeake a suite of armore which I caused to be made to fit me, with the harnesse of a horseman. Thus instructed, we shall at once In October Mr. Evelyn returned to enter upon the subject; and have only England, and, with his brother, took to state, for the satisfaction of our arms for the King in the civil war friends, that we have taken such measures which immediately ensued; but owing as almost ensure to the Literary Gazette to the contiguity of their estate to the certainty of obtaining the earliest London, they were not allowed to continue with the army to bring destruc-gress of which we are pretty confident accounts of the Expeditions, of the protion on their house without advantage we shall have the pleasure of being the to the royal cause. They retired there- first to lay a full and accurate Journal fore without being known as cavaliers. before our readers. In 1643, 10th of March, he notices a sight which amazed them, "viz. a shining clowd in the ayre, in shape resembling a sword, the point reaching to the north; it was as bright as the moone, the rest of the sky being very serene. It began about 11 at night, and vanish'd not till about one, being seen by all the south of England." On the 24 of May he saw the furious and zelous people demolish that stately Crosse in Cheapside," and in the month of July after, once more visited the Continent. But having now performed our purpose of introducing this highly entertaining publication to our readers, we must, for the present, to make room for various other matters, draw our notes to a concision. THE ARCTIC EXPEDITIONS. In our Numbers of the 28th February and 14th March, we laid before our readers some interesting information relative to the Arctic Seas, and to the Expeditions which have now sailed on the project of approaching the North Pole, and passing from the Atlantic into the Pacific Ocean by a NE. or NW. pa sage. It was our good for The name of Captain Wm. Scoresby, junior, is familiar to all who have taken an interest in the problem, the solution of which is now attempting His observations on a voyage, wherein he penetrated to a very high northern latitude, may be considered as the foundation for this attempt; and the paper containing his remarks, read to the Wernerian Natural History Society, and contained in the second volume of their Memoirs, cannot fail to be reckoned extremely important. The following is its substance, and the only alteration we make, is that of putting Captain Scoresby's information into our own language, instead of copying that of the literary gentleman who prepared it for the Wernerian Society: Greenland is a country where every object is strikingly singular, or highly magnificent. The atmosphere, the land, and the ocean, each exhibit remarkable or sublime appearances. The atmosphere is dark coloured, dense, frequently producing crystallized snow in a wonderful perfection and variety of form and texture, and remarkable for sudden transitions from calm to storm, from foul to fair. and The land is a sublime object; its stupendous mountains rising abruptly from the The water affords the bed and partly the materials for the most prodigious masses of ice. Its colour is peculiar. Its products mysticetus, or whalebone whale, resides and numerous and important. Here the huge collects his food; sports and astonishes by his vast bulk and proportionate strength: is the object of maritimet adventure and land, none excites so much interest and commercial wealth. Of the inanimate productions of Greenwonder as the ice in its great abundance and variety, in the ice-islands, floating mountains, or ice-bergs, common to Davis' Straits. Yet the fields of ice more peculiar to Greenland are not less astonishing. Their deficiency in elevation is sufficiently surface. Some of them have been obcompensated by their amazing extent of served near a hundred miles in length, and We are assured by a Greenland captain, that he has seen the bear display astonishing proofs of sagacity. When wounded by a musket-shot, they will apply ice to the wound with their paws, in order to stanch the bleeding. Of this fact our informant has been an eye witness.-Ed. + The perils of the whale-fishing fill the navigator's life with "moving accidents by flood," and their adventures are truly deserving of the tragical. One lash of the monster of the deep name of romantic, as well as of dangerous and will dash their little boat in pieces, and break the limbs of men like the wheel, or crush them together as with an avalanche. When the whale has young, she is particularly fierce, and requires to be approached with caution; and her materpal fondness is so great, that if her offspring is struck with the harpoon, she will not desert it, and the fishers are sure of the parent. It is a strange sight to see these unwieldy creatures with the young laid, as it were, across their tails, sucking their "mighty mothers." Boats are sometimes carried through the spumy sea at the rate of fourteen miles an hour, by the harpooned whale, and many an instance occurs of their never returning to join their vessels. There is some resemblance to the magnificence of Eastern hunting in these exploits.-Ed. A field is a continued sheet of ice, so large, that its boundary cannot be seen from the summit of a ship's mast, more than half that breadth; each consisting of a single sheet of ice, having its surface raised in general four or six feet above the level of the water, and its base depressed to the depth of near twenty feet beneath. We shall now extract literatim Capt. Scoresby's excellent description of the various kinds of ice, which are met in the Northern seas. The ice in general, is designated by a variety of appellations, distinguishing it according to the size or number of pieces, their form of aggregation, thickness, transparency, &c. perhaps cannot better explain the terms in common acceptation amongst the whale-fishers, than by marking the disruption of a field. The thickest and strongest field cannot resist the power of a heavy swell; indeed, such are much less capable of bending without being dissevered, than the thinner ice which is more pliable. When a field, by the set of the current, drives to the southward, and, being deserted by the loose ice, becomes exposed to the effects of a grown swell, it presently breaks into a great many pieces, few of which will exceed forty or fifty yards in diameter. Now, such a number of these pieces collected together in close contact, so that they cannot, from the top of the ship's mast, be seen over, are termed a pack. When the collection of pieces can be seen across, if it assume a circular or polygonal form, the name of patch is applied, and it is called a stream when its shape is more of an oblong, how narrow soever it may be, provided the continuity of the pieces is pre served. Pieces of very large dimensions, but smaller than fields, are called floes; thus a field may be compared to a pack, and a floe to a patch, as regards their size and external form. Small pieces which break off, and are separated from the larger masses by the effect of attrition, are called brash-ice, and may be collected into streams or patches. Ice is said to be loose, or open, when the pieces are so far separated as to allow a ship to sail freely amongst them; this has likewise been called drift-ice. some larger mass; from beneath which it shews itself on one side. I have seen a calf so deep and broad, that the ship sailed over it without touching, when it might be observed on both sides of the vessel at the same time; this, however, is attended with considerable danger, and necessity alone warrants the experiment, as calves have not unfrequently (by a ship's touching, or disturbing the sea near them) been called from their sub-marine situation to the sur face, and with such an accelerated velocity as to stave the planks and timbers of the ship, and in some instances to reduce the vessel to a wreck. Any part of the upper superficies of a piece of ice, which comes to be immersed beneath the surface of the water, obtains the name of a tongue. A bight signifies a bay or sinuosity, on the border of any large mass or body of ice. It is supposed to be called bight, from the low word bite, or take in, or entrap; because, in this situation, ships are sometimes so caught by a change of wind, that the ice cannot be cleared on either tack; and in some cases, a total loss has been the consequence. When salt-water ice floats in the sea at a freezing temperature, the proportion above to that below the surface, is as 1 to 4 nearly; and in fresh water, at the freezing point, as 10 to 69, or 1 to 7 nearly. Hence its specific gravity appears to be about 0.873. Of this description is all young ice, as it is called, which forms a considerable proportion of packed and drift ice in general; where it occurs in flat pieces commonly covered with snow, of various dimensions, but seldom exceeding fifty yards in diameter. Fresh-water ice is distinguished by its black appearance when floating in the sea, and its beautiful green hue and transparency when removed into the air. Large pieces may occasionally be obtained, possessing a degree of purity and transparency equal to that of the finest glass, or most beautiful crystal; but generally, its transparency is interrupted by numerous small globular or pear-shaped air-bubbles: these frequently form continuous lines, intersecting the ice in a direction apparently perpendicular to its plane of formation. A hummock is a protuberance, raised Fresh-water ice is fragile, but hard; the upon any plane of ice above the common edges of a fractured part are frequently level. It is frequently produced by pressure, so keen, as to inflict a wound like glass. where one piece is squeezed upon another, The homogeneous and most transparent often set upon its edge, and in that position pieces are capable of concentrating the cemented by the frost. Hummocks are rays of the sun, so as to produce a consilikewise formed, by pieces of ice mutually derable intensity of heat. With a lump of crushing each other, the wreck being coa-ice of by no means regular convexity, I cervated upon one or both of them. To have frequently burnt wood, fired gunhummocks, the ice is indebted for its powder, melted lead, and lit the sailors' variety of fanciful shapes, and its pictur- pipes to their great astonishment; all of esque appearance. They occur in great whom who could procure the needful artinumbers in heavy packs, on the edges, and cles, eagerly flocked around me, for the occasionally in the middle of fields and satisfaction of smoking a pipe, ignited by floes. They often attain the height of such extraordinary means. Their astonishthirty feet and upwards. ment was increased, on observing that the ice remained firm and pellucid, whilst the solar rays emerging therefrom were so hot, that the hand could not be kept longer A calf, is a portion of ice which has been depressed by the same means as a hummock is elevated. It is kept down by in the focus than for the space of a few seconds. In the formation of these lenses, I roughed them with a small axe, which cut the ice tolerably smooth; I then scraped them with a knife, and polished them merely by the warmth of the hand, supporting them during the operation in a woollen glove. I once procured a piece of the purest ice so large that a lens of sixteen inches diameter was obtained out of it. - - The most dense kind of ice, which is perfectly transparent, is about one-tenth specifically lighter than sea water at a freezing temperature. Plunged into pure water, of temperature 32o, the proportion floating above, to that below the surface, is as I to 15, and placed in boiling fresh water, it barely floats. Its specific gravity is about 0.937. Fields, bergs, and other large masses, chiefly consist of this kind of ice. Brash ice likewise affords pieces of it, the surfaces of which are always found crowded with conchoidal excavations when taken out of the sea. Captain Scoresby states, that land is not necessary for the formation of ice; even in a rough state the ocean freezes, forming first detached crystals, the sludge of the sailors, and resembling snow when cast into water which is too cold to dissolve it. This smooths the surface of the waters like oil, and the congelation which ensues forms ultimately into pieces called pancakes, of perhaps a foot in thickness, and many yards in circumference. In sheltered situations, what is termed bay ice, forms more regularly and rapidly. Much of this is formed in the bays and islands will not account for the immense fields of Spitzbergen, but even this quantity which abound in the Greenland Seas, and which evidently (says our authority) come from the Northward, and have their origin between Spitzbergen and the Pole. With this important, and, for the Expeditions, rather unfavourable observation, we conclude for the present. Memoires et Correspondance de Madame D'Epinay. 8vo. 3 vols. The state of society in the literary and higher circles in France, for the half century preceding the Revolution, has always been represented as combining all the charms of polished and elegant manners, of brilliant and elegant wit, and of profound and varied erudition. Of the accuracy of that description, the numerous publications which have within the last few years appeared connected with that subject, enable us to form a judgment with some degree of precision. We have always thought that this picture was much too favourably drawn, and that opinion has been greatly strengthened by the perusal of the work before us.* Though this narrative of Madame D'Epinay's life is not entertaining from the variety or the singularity of her adventures, yet it is interesting, from the close and minute view which it affords us of the state of society at that period, and curious, from the frankness with which she avows her intrigues, and from the high opi nion which she professes to entertain of the propriety of her conduct and the purity of her morals. It must be acknowledged in justice to Madame D'Epinay, that she commenced her career under unfavourable circumstances. She was married when very young to a man of large fortune, whose understanding was contempti ble, and whose habits were dissipated; and all her female friends (we believe we may speak almost without exception) were as sentimentally profligate, and as philosophically shameless, as the new lights which were then begin. ning to illumine France could make them. Madame D'Epinay assures us that her attachment to her husband was at first of the warmest, and indeed of the most romantic kind, but it very soon subsided into the most perfect indifference, and after the birth of her second child they agreed to a separation a Thoro though not a Mensa; they lived together in the same house, she receiving her lovers and her philosophers without any restraint, and he occasionally availing himself of the superiority of her taste in the choice of lace and other articles as presents for his mistresses. It is impossible to give an abridgment of this most extraordinary piece of auto-biography; but we will select a few anecdotes, to shew that we have not spoken with unwarrantable harshness of this lady's husband or her friends. Very soon after her marriage, Madame D'Epinay went to a masqued ball, where she entered into conversation with a person who appeared to be so perfectly acquainted with every incident of her domestic life, that she became extremely anxious to know who he was her curiosity was not, how These Memoirs were originally written in the form of a Romance, with fictitious names, and are alluded to by Grimm, in his Correspondance Litteraire,&c.; and as the fortune of Madame D'Epinay enabled her to associate with the higher ranks, and her talents procured her the acquaintance of most of the literati of the day, she had all the means of making a faithful por trait. cumstances of the Chevalier himself were ever, gratified till two nights after- | lity of our ages, and my insufficiency of wards, when on going to bed she found fortune, and as I felt perfectly happy as I upon her pillow a note from the Che-was, I made an effort to conquer my scruvalier de C... acknowledging him- ples, particularly as I knew that the cirself to be the unknown mask, and pro- by no means affluent. He began to make fessing a most ardent passion for her. reflections, and I proposed that we should In relating this adventure to her cousin, continue to live as we were, which he the wife of the President of M. ..., agreed to. I quitted my native province, Madame D'Epinay says, and followed him to Paris: I need not tell you how I live there. days of the week in company with me: at He spends four other times we are content with hearing from each other, unless when we happen to and contented; perhaps we might not be We live happily meet by chance. quite so happy if we were married. I am confounded at what you tell me, and I scarcely know where I am, interrupted I; I feel that it would be very long before I could accustom myself to such notions.Not so long as you imagine, she replied; I pledge myself that you would soon find my morality simple enough: and you are born to enjoy it. You may well imagine how greatly this insolence displeased me. I reproved my waiting-woman, and immediately carried the letter to my husband, not a little vexed for having opened it without his knowledge. Would you believe it? he laughed heartily, and confessed that he had himself dictated to the Chevalier a portion of the discourse which he addressed to me at the ball, merely for the sake of diverting himself at my astonishment; but that the rogue (these are the very words he used) had not timents, nor his intention of writing to me. made him the confidante of his tender sen Of Madame D'Houdetot, Madame D'Epinay's sister-in-law, it is unne Unluckily, the President of M.'s wife," whom Madame D'Epinay had selected for her confidante upon this occasion, was the mistress of this identical Che-cessary to speak; her intrigues with the Marquis de St. Lambert, and others, valier de C....!! Want of chastity, indeed, in a female, appears not then to fair specimen of that class of French are well known. This is the lady, a have formed any obstacle to her admission into society. Madame D'Arty, one society, whom Grimm says, “Le of Madame D'Epinay's early friends, is public qui juge séverèment ne voit thus described by Rousseau :pas seulement en elle une mauvaise tête mais une femme sans pudeur et sans modestie." The natural daughter of the rich Samuel her gentleness and benevolent disposition, Bernard a woman equally estimable for the charms of her understanding, and the unalterable gaiety of her temper. She was the mistress, or rather the friend, the only friend, of the Prince de Conti.-(Rousseau's Confessions, Book VII.) The negotiation which preceded her marriage, affords a curious specimen of the manners of the times, but is too long for our present Number. By WM. READ, Esq. Indeed, this lady seemed to think THE HILL OF CAVES, with other Poems, that so little disgrace attached to her situation, or rather, was so proud of her prostitution, that she dates one of her letters in the following manner :— "A six heures du matin en rentrant de Chez le Prince de Conti." Another early friend of Madame D'Epinay's, Mademoiselle D'Ette (to whom she was introduced by her husband,) thus describes herself :— We have in latter times received from Ireland some very noble contributions to the mind and the glory of the empire. She has supplied us with great orators, vigorous statesmen, and distiveness seems to have fallen into the tinguished soldiers. But her producwane, and, with the exception of one name now first of the first in soldiership, About ten years ago, when I lost my Ireland has given no tribute to the mother, I was seduced by the Chevalier de mighty struggle in which the world has Valory, who had known me from my child- been involved and shaken. hood; my extreme youth, joined to the nothing from her beyond the victories confidence I reposed in him, prevented me at first from suspecting his designs. It was of petty faction and personal disconlong before I perceived them, and when tent, the boastings of suspicious pahis intentions were no longer doubtful, I triotism, and the menaces of vulgar inhad conceived such an attachment for him, surrection. This is all melancholy; that I was unable to resist him. Some the crime or the folly by which such a scruples arose in my mind, but he overcame state of things has been produced, may them by promising to marry me. deed made several endeavours to that ef- yet, and with no long interval, deepen fect; but observing that his family op- into fearful and tempestuous agitation. posed our union on account of the inequa- | But there are still manly minds and ho He in We hear nourable hearts in Ireland. The poems to which we are about to refer are the work of a man of talents and principle. If there is a feature which attracts us additionally to these poems, it is the | Ere eve, the breeze which blew so fair, XXI. An instant roll'd each eye-ball sightless; XXII. Borne wildly on the tempest's wing, with She is borne from the prison; their flight is perceived, and they are forced to fight their way. L. They now had gained the gentler slope Their splendour broke the eagle's sleep, Some Spirit poised on dusky wing the They reach the water's side; princess is placed in the bark, but they have not yet escaped from the Druids, The who pursue them into the waves. triumphant catastrophe is told with great animation and picturesque power: LIII. part of Ireland in which they were writ-Then burst the cloud which o'er them hung ;- which we commence our extracts, less from their intrinsic beauty than from THE DRUID'S SHRINE. XIX. 'O'er billows kissed by morning's dies, xx. But winds and waves are faithless ever, XXIII. All, save young Irial's ;—sternly bright, That host was rushing thro' the water, LIV. 'Twas stern Siornah, Ullin's king: The vessel is driven on the to enjoy the stranger's privilege, of not No more that Chief thro' blood shall roam, The poem closes with a farewell of the Bard to the country which he was thus forced to abandon. We may at a future time give further extracts. How much is it to be desired that the fine mind of Ireland should more generally be turned into this di victim than the one whom they saw this single effort of a man of genius, to the whole mass of her giddy harangues and paltry pamphleteering! how much more healthful and noble the glow of this enthusiasm, than the perpetual disfiguring inflammation, that only betrays the morbidness within, poverty of spirit, and dissoluteness of principle! An Essay on the Origin and Operation of the Dry Rot, with a View to its Prevention or Cure. To which are annexed, Suggestions on the Cultivation of Forest Trees, and an Abstract of the several Forest Laws, from the Reign of Canute to the Present Time. By RoArchitect. 4to. bert M Williams, nation. The disease, which it is the object to prevent, or cure, makes annually the greatest ravages in our shipping, and houses, and may be considered as the bane to our prosperity. This will hardly be thought asserting too much, when it is stated, that at the present time there are several ships of the line, and from 20 to 30 frigates, in which it has made the most destructive progress. It has been reckoned, that the annual expense to the government, occasioned by the destruction of timber, and the loss of labour in the necessary repairs, was not less than from two to three, and to the whole nation, from four to five millions sterling. Under such circumstances it was to be expected that many should have turned their attention to the subject, and accordingly many cures have been proposed. In particular cases they may have been useful; but like the domestic practice of popular medicines for diseases of the body, whilst the physiological structure and principles of action were not understood, frequent failures necessarily followed. It is altogether in vain to hope by means of nostrums to eradicate so great an evil. We are happy to observe the author of this Essay fully persuaded of this fact. He has applied himself to investigate the economy of nature in the production of vegetables; he examines minutely the structure of the fir and oak, with which we are most concerned in building, and traces the various causes from which diseases originate, and endeavours, upon fixed principles, to prevent the evil, or to arrest its progress after it has begun. The Author's plan has swelled his volume to a great bulk, but it will be found to contain a mass of matter interesting and entertaining to the general reader, as well as to ship-builders, or to gentlemen of fortune, who are more immediately concerned. In the explanation of the growth of plants, we observe him ascribing to a change of temperature, the principal cause of the rise of the sap. The air in the tubes being expanded rises up, and forces the sap before it; and there being innumerable valves to prevent its return, the process goes on. In opposition to Sir Humphrey Davy, Mr. Knight, and indeed to most preceding writers, our author denies any specific effect from light in producing vegetation, and contends, with a considerable show of reason, and from a number of experiments, that in all cases where light has been supposed to have effect, it arises entirely from a change of temperature produced by the solar rays; and he maintains, that if an equal degree of heat, with an equal supply of fresh air, could be afforded, the effect would be the same. Our limits will not permit us to enter into the details, and we must refer to the work itself. The great enemy of timber, whether growing or cut down, is a numerous tribe of plants, denominated Fungi: equally parasitical with the more celebrated misletoe of the Druids, they fix their roots in the substance of the wood, and drawing from it a constant supply for their own growth, they decompose its fibre, and render it use- | then lay each brick on a pure clean surface, Matter containing the seeds of fungi is often brought in the form of rubbish in contact with the bricks or wood of a building. In the mixing up of mortar, water is often brought from stagnant pools; and one pail full may contain millions of particles, susceptible of germination, when deposited on a favourable soil. Such seeds after lying dormant for many years may be made to vegetate. The seeds of fungi are embodied in other vegetable matter, which our author proves by the following experiment: Take two well-burnt bricks from the interior of a brick kiln, when no vegetable matter can have come in contact with them since they were thoroughly burnt; to one of these add a portion of distilled water sufficient thoroughly to moisten the whole brick; let the other brick be moistened with the juice of any vegetable, such as that of cabbage leaves, either green or boiled, or lay it for a few minutes on the edge of such a pond as before mentioned, that it may receive the stagnant water to moisten it equally with the other brick; Frequently the disease is communicated to houses from the improper construction of drains or cesspools, into which vegetable matter is thrown-and all means of cure until these be altered, can only produce a temporary benefit. Sometimes it is introduced into a house with saw-dust, or even with the corks of bottles. An example is given in page 87 of this having taken place in two houses near Berkeley Square. The proprietors had both purchased wine from a wine merchant whose cellars were affected with the disease. The author remarks :— "This disease is very advantageous to wine merchants, as it soon covers the bottles with its mouldy appearance, and consumes the external parts of the corks, so that with a trifling operation on the bottles, after they are filled, and then deposited in cellars pretty strongly affected with the dryrot, they can send out wine as having been bottled in cellars for seven or eight years, before it has in fact been there so many months." The most important part of the inquiry relates to the means of cure. Here the common mistake has been to endeavour to discover a panacea or universal remedy. This is no less absurd than the preposterous attempts made to find such a medicine for the human frame. It is necessary to ascertain the cause of the contagion, and to remove it, in order to prevent a recurrence of the same evil. When the disease has originated in the materials, as the bricks and timbers, and has not made great progress, the infected parts must be removed, and sound materials introduced. "Where the cause is putrescent vapour from other corrupting matter, such matter must be removed, and the situation thoroughly cleansed, and the air rendered pure, dry, and susceptible of continual motion, or passing in a current through every part of the building. And it is of the first importance, that in all cases, edifices be constructed in such a manner, as to admit of the common air shifting its place with facility, that it may not by being stagnant acquire a fermenting heat, or accumulate vapour impregnated with particles of the sur rounding materials." The position of the fireplace, particularly in the lower parts of the building, is a mat ter of great consequence, in order to produce an uniform circulation of air. In the con |