writings which he has left behind him, and to which we have briefly alluded, are distinguished for a strong attachment to the public welfare and general liberty; all of them, without excepting the life of Epaminondas, which he wrote at the age of eight and a half, display sentiments full of novelty and elevation of sentiment, expressed in a style remarkable for its neatness, simplicity, and perspicuity. In this respect, it forms a striking contrast with the style of his brother, which is frequently turgid and declamatory; and more remarkable for good ideas, than for good French.

ART. XXII. Almanach Philanthropique, ou Tableau des Societés et Institutions de Bienfaisance, d'Education, et d'Utilité Publique de la Ville de Paris. Par Eugene Cassin. 16mo. pp. 216. Paris and London: Treüttel & Wurtz. 1827.

NOTWITHSTANDING its affected title, this is really a useful little volume; and we were about to begin by wishing that, in this land of benevolent establishments, we possessed such a directory to the means of procuring ready assistance for the distressed, or of best employing the funds destined by the idle or the busy for the relief of their fellow creatures, when we learned from the avertissement, that the idea of the work had been taken from an English publication, bearing the humbler name of A Manual of Charity. But if our French neighbours occasionally condescend to borrow the original inventions of John Bull, they appropriate them by alterations far beyond our insular genius. We accordingly find in L'Almanach Philanthropique, institutions which, though unquestionably of public utility, no Englishman would have dreamed of classing with hospitals and charitable societies.

The Almanach is divided into eight chapters, of which we translate the titles: 1st, Hospitals, Alms-Houses (if we may thus render Hospices), and Relief administered to the Poor at home. 2nd, Philanthropic Societies, and Societies for mutual Assistance. 3rd, Societies for the Support of Schools and Improvement of Education. 4th, Religious Societies. 5th, Societies and Institutions for the Encouragement of Industry, the Sciences, and the Arts. 6th, Institutions and Establishments of Public Instruction. 7th, Prisons. 8th, Succours provided in case of Fire. These heads of chapters give a sufficient general idea of the work.

Hospitals abound in Paris, but are, like the alms-houses, even when supported by private funds, almost without exception managed by government. All we need say of them is, that one species of French hospital might, we think, be advantageously introduced in England. We mean the Maison de Santé, which admits no absolutely gratuitous patients. The price paid depends upon the style of accommodation required; and there are separate apartments in which persons of the better classes of society, but of narrow fortune, may, at the moderate expense of four or five shillings a-day, be both respectably and conveniently lodged, and moreover doctored, physicked, and dieted, in a way they might be ill able to afford at their own homes. The Bureaux de Charité are government establishments for relieving indigence, which serve seemingly as a substitute for our poor-rates. The Mont de Pieté, or government pawnbroker's shop, has

been made sufficiently known here, by the recent attempt to establish a joint-stock company of lucrative benevolence,

The second chapter offers a list of several private associations for benevolent purposes. A Society of Prison Discipline has been lately established, under the especial patronage of the King; and one of Christian Morality might seem to render all others superfluous, embracing every object from the Greeks and the Slave Trade to the Suppression of Vice. Friendly societies are so numerous that a catalogue of their pompous titles fills 45 of the 200 pages forming the volume. Their invention is claimed for France, by referring one to the year 1329.

Schools upon the Bell or Lancaster system appear to be increasing, and as M. Cassin cannot well claim the invention for France, he asserts that it has there been perfected, and thence spread over the Globe. In the chapter of Public Instruction, we find the Université, and all public schools which mingle gratuitous scholars, like those upon our foundations, with scholars who pay. Paris contains eight actually public libraries, and many more to which access is easily obtained. This is the point in which the French metropolis is really entitled to boast its superiority over its English rival. It possesses about thirty literary and scientific societies, amongst which we find non more remarkable than that for fine penmanship, or the most talented Artistes Ecrivains. The prisons come, we think, only prospectively into the list of philanthropic institutions, even according to M. Cassin's own view of the subject; and the 8th chapter merely gives, as the result of royal munificence, those establishments of fireengines, fire-men, &c., which are in London the effect of mercantile speculation, or parochial arrangement.

We have thus run through seven of the eight chapters, reserving for the last, on account of its peculiar and interesting nature, that upon Religious Societies. We know not whether the English public be aware that patients in French hospitals are attended, not by mercenary nurses, but by societies of hospital-sisters, to whom of late years an order of hospital brothers has, we learn, been added. The idea of the nobly born, the highly educated, and the affluent, voluntarily undertaking the most loathsome menial offices about the poor, the coarse, and the vicious, seizes upon the heart and imagination as the pure sublime of Christian charity, and might go far to reconcile the most intolerant Protestant to the monasticity of Catholicism. It is true the Sœurs de la Charité are not, and we believe never were, bound by the indissoluble vows of nuns; but the institution is, nevertheless, in its nature essentially monastic, and could hardly exist where a large portion of either sex was not habitually devoted to a life of celibacy. We have an abundance of old maids and old bachelors, who might dedicate their wearisome leisure to some of our hospitals, with advantage to themselves and the public.

ART. XXIII. La Legislation, Civile, Commerciale, et Criminelle, de la France. Par M. Le Baron Locré. 8vo. pp. 640. Paris and London: Treüttel & Wurtz. 1827.

THIS volume forms the first of a series of twenty-four volumes, which will make up the collection intended to be published by Baron Locré. As soon as the work shall have made further progress, we may perhaps be

disposed to notice it more in detail. The plan of the baron, who was formerly general secretary to the council of state, will embrace the history of the five codes, which now regulate the judicial and legal transactions of the French nation; namely, the code civil, the code de procedure, the code de commerce, the code d'instruction criminelle, and the code penal.' It will exhibit also the forms in which they have been discussed and adopted; as well as the laws which have been made since the restoration, with a view to modify and restrict them. The discussion of these French codes, and especially of that of the code civil, presents to the view of the philosophical jurisconsult, a very interesting spectacle, which is sometimes very lively and amusing, especially when we consider the characters of the performers on the legal scene; and that the discussion was carried on by lawyers, administrators, military men, and financiers; by men of rank, and of various talents, among whom Napoleon himself, frequently made a grand display. At this peculiar period, when England manifests a disposition to improve her legal system, and to ameliorate both the civil and commercial laws, a work of the nature of the baron's will be consulted with advantage, by those who engage in the task of improving our institutions; although the first volume, which now lies before us, gives us reason to fear, that M. Locré is deficient in impartiality in the execution of his task, and that, in order to please the actual government of France, he frequently attacks governments by which he was formerly employed, and curtails the free and intrepid expressions of some of the republican orators, who had a share in the compilation of the French codes.

ART. XXIV. Resumé de l'histoire litterarire du Portugal, suivi du Resumé de l'histoire litterarire du Bresil. Par Ferdinand Denis. 1 vol., 18mo. pp. 625. Paris: Lecointe et Durey. 1827..

VERY few of those who belong to the class of general readers, know scarcely any thing of the literary history of Portugal, beyond what is involved in the biography of Camoens. The work of M. Denis, presents a long catalogue of Portuguese writers of various merit, who have, by their productions, influenced the taste and stimulated the intellect of their countrymen. Of the ability of most of these authors, we are enabled to from some notion from the opinions expressed by M. Denis, and from the extracts cited by him from their respective writings.

The life of Camoens, and the notice of his works, occupy deservedly a large portion of this history; the critical disquisition is marked by a fine perception of poetical beauty, and by a sympathetic admiration of his author; tempered, however, by a spirit of just criticism. Portugal seems to be fertile in epic poems. Besides the Lusiad, which is now read in all civilised languages, we have an analysis of Alphonso the African, by Quebedo; of Ulysses, or the Foundation of Lisbon, by Castro; the Conquest of Malacca, by Menezes; and Sepulveda, by Corte-Real. Mr. Denis intermingles with the account of the celebrated writers of Portugal, notices of the state of letters at different times; pointing out the character which applies to each era respectively, and adverting to the political or moral causes by which the taste and the talent of the Portuguese were directed and called forth. The literary history of Portugal is then

carried down to our own times, and an able summary is given of the existing state of almost every branch of human knowledge in that country.

The portion of the work which is devoted to an account of the state of letters in the Brazils, is occupied not so much with an historical reference to what is past, as with speculations upon the probable condition of literature in future times, in that empire. M. Denis notices, however, two Brazilian poems. The first is called Caramourou, by Durao. The characters consist of savages and Portuguese,-manners are exactly described -the Christian religion alone is alluded to-the author appears to possess energy and spirit, but he is a mere imitator of the ancients. The other poem is entitled War of the Missions of Uraguay,' to which the remarks that were called forth by the former poem, may with equal justice be applied.

LITERARY AND MISCELLANEOUS INTELLIGENCE.

Domestic and Foreign.

THE Noctes Ambrosianæ, of Blackwood's Magazine, which some two or three years ago were pleasant, and occasionally piquante enough, have, under the present editor, degenerated into the most licentious scurrility. Indeed the whole tone of that once able and caustic periodical has been so sadly altered of late, that we scarcely recognise it as the lawful offspring of Ebony. It is a spurious and fulsome compilation, in which affectation and vulgarity contend for pre-eminence. Of course the sale of the magazine has been considerably reduced by its glaring boorishness and bad taste; from thousands it has fallen to hundreds. We believe the editor is the same person who wrote in the Amulet for this year, one or two tales, so ludicrously turgid and nonsensical, that they have almost caused the death of that innocent annual.

By the way, talking of annuals, we understand, that there is to be a whole batch of novelties in this way on the carpet about November next. November! did we say? Some are to be out in August, to cool the fervour of the dog days! This is quite ridiculous. Why do not some of these speculators undertake a semi-annual? one for Christmas, the other for Easter; and, in order to drive their literary trade the better, they might publish the Easter volume at Christmas, and the Christmas one at Easter.

We desire, however, not to be misunderstood, as including among those quackeries, "The Keepsake," for which the plates are to be provided by the principal proprietor, Charles Heath, and the literary matter by Mr. Ainsworth, the promising author of Sir John Chiverton. This volume is to be of a size larger, and, of course, a price higher, than any of those annuals with which the public are already acquainted.

A similar publication has also been projected by Sir Thomas Lawrence, aided by Mr. Balmanno, of which we are disposed to form favourable anticipations.

It is gratifying to know, that the revolution which lately agitated the bookselling world has nearly subsided, and that as trade is now conducted

upon safe and substantial principles, it is not likely to be again "affrighted from its propriety," for another cycle.

We perceive, in the second edition of "Death's Doings," a considerable accession of letter-press and of new plates to illustrate it. The work is no favourite of our's, and we think it not at all the better for the six pages of laudatory criticism which introduce it, extracted from Bell's Life in London, and several other equally notable authorities. We have ourselves known of instances, where the same individual has written puffs of the same work in ten different newspapers, and these puffs we have seen appended to advertisements of the work, for the purpose of leading the public to suppose, that they expressed the unsolicited and concurrent opinions of ten unconnected literary tribunals. But the eyes of the public, of the reading public at least, are now opened to these arts; and the days of puff, like those of hair powder, are nearly gone by. We must do Mr. Dagley, however, the justice to say, that his second edition, which he has judiciously divided into two volumes, is very much superior to the first, and that those who were pleased with the one, cannot fail to be still more amused with the other.

A foreign Quarterly Review and Continental Literary Miscellany, which is to be exclusively devoted to foreign literature, has been announced.

The Rev. J. A. Ross is preparing a translation from the German of Hirsch's Geometry, uniform with his translation of Hirsch's Algebra.

A translation of some of the most popular Fairy Tales from the German is in the press; they will be illustrated by Cruikshank.

We understand that a new work is in preparation, to be entitled "The Theological Encyclopædia," embracing every topic connected with Biblical Criticism and Theology.

This seems to be the "age of reviews." We have a prospectus before us of "The Jurist; a Quarterly Journal of Jurisprudence and Legislation;" a work which, if well executed, would be extremely useful.

The Abate Romani has just completed his General Dictionary of Italian Synonimes, published at Milan; a work very much wanted, and of the greatest utility to the Italian scholar.

The society of publishers of the Italian classics at Milan, having completed their edition of the great works on the arts, by the celebrated Visconti, viz. the two Iconographies and the Museo Pio-Clementino, have begun the publication of his minor works, mostly inedited or become very scarce. The learned Dr. Labus, of Brescia, superintends this edition, which will come out in numbers, and consist of four vols., 8vo.

The Biografia universale antica e moderna, which is in course of publication at Venice, has reached its thirty-first vol.-letters L. A.

A new Medical Journal has been announced by Dr. Strambio, of Milan, under the title of Giornale critico de Medicina Italiana. His object,' the Doctor says, is to rescue the medical science in Italy from the state of anarchy into which it has fallen, in consequence of the exclusive doctrines of Stimolo and Contrastimolo.'

The recent happy changes in the Ministry have of course given rise to