weights, measures, and monies of all trading countries by official experiments on verified standards. The experiments were made by Robert Bingley, Esq. the King's Assay Master of the Mint; and the calculations by Dr. Kelly, who planned and conducted the general comparison, and in 1821 published the results in the Universal Cambist, under the sanction of His Majesty's Government. The under taking was originally patronized and recommended by the Board of Trade. The standards were procured from abroad by circular letters issued by Viscount Castlereagh and Earl Bathurst, Secretaries of State for the Foreign and Colonial Departments; and the whole plan was essentially promoted by Lord Maryborough Master of the Mint." phenomena are not produced by any changes of temperature, or by common electrical repulsion, and concludes that they are of a novel kind.comb Weights and Measures-A communication from Mr. D. Gilbert states, that the object of the late parliamentary commission of weights and measures, was to recommend a minimum of alteration of the four kinds of measures of length; of superficies of solidity of this last as containing concrete substances or weight. The commission found the said weights and measures perfect to all practical purposes; they have in consequence recommended that they should be left unaltered; selecting for philosophical purposes, the three-feet rule of Sir George Shuckburgh, as the identical one, because the trigonometrical suravey has been made from it. We purposef The Temperature at considerable depths that copies of this scale should be dispersed of the Caribbean Sea.-Captain Sabine over the kingdom; and they have given found the temperature of the water, at the length of the pendulum and of the a depth of 6000 feet, in French metre in parts of this scale. Su- and long, 831 W. near atitude 20 N. 919 junction of the Mexican and Caribbean Seas, to be 45° 5, that of the surface being 83°. He infers, that one or two hundred fathoms more line, would have caused the thermometer to descend into water at its maximum of density as depends on heat; this inference being on the presumption that the greatest density of salt water occurs, as is the case in fresh water, at several degrees above its freezing point. dperficies, of course, follows linear measure. The Troy pound is unaltered; duplicates of this are about to be made, and, as a matter of scientific curiosity, a foot or an inch of water is compared with it. The Avoirdupois pound being probably within two grains of 7000, is made this exact number. In the third division all is absolute confusion; there something must be done; and as the great body of the people are interested chiefly in ale and beer measures, it has been thought best to propose the new measure between these but instead of the for the purpose of of an exact arithmetical o mean, to vary it a making it weigh 10 pounds of water, by its rectification will be most body of Henry Darnleybalming) the which mean Ju easy, at any time, by means of a pair of scales # 9d1ovede med tids The standard weights of Foreign countries, which were some time since vis transmitted to the British Government, and compared with English standards, have been lately deposited at the London Mint, in a commodious cabinet construct Scotch Antiquaries.-The Society of Scottish Antiquaries lately heard two very interesting original historical documents read signed Huntly," for the disbursement by Mr. Macdonald. One was an order of 401. for perfuming the other was an order for providing suitable mourning for the Queen, and was signed by her own fair hand. Copies of these very curious documents were left with the Society. Fossil Shells. By Lewis Weston Dillwyn, Esq. F.R.S.-Mr. Dillwyn remarks, that every turbinated univalve of the older beds, from transition Time to the lias, of ed for the purpose, where they are to be which he can find any reco that the to carefully preserved, for permanent refe rence. This national collection is the first of the kind ever made on a great scale, though long considered a desideratum. Its utility, which has been already exten sively proved, may be further experienced when any of the standards in use, whether English or Foreign, shall become worn or impaired. The following account of this important collection is inscribed on the cabinet: The Foreign weights here deposited, having been duly verified, were transmitted to London in the year 1818, by the British consuls abroad, in pursuance of a general plan for comparing the the herbivorous genera, family has been handed down through all the successive strata, and still inhabits our land and waters. On the other hand, all the carnivorous genera abound in the strata above the chalk, but are, comparatively, extremely rare in the secondary strata, and not a single shell has been detected in any lower bed than the lower bolite. He thinks, that a further examination will prove, that neither the aporrhaïdes, nor any of those few undoubtedly carnivorous spedies, which have been found in the se'condary formatious, were furnished with predaceous powers, but that they belong to a subdivision of the trachelipoda zoophaga, which feed only on dead animals. 1 Supposed Effect of Magnetism on Crys tallization. The following is an experiment first made by Professor Maschmann, of Christiana, and confirmed by Professor Hanstein, of the same city; we should not have noticed it but for these names. A glass tube is to be bent into a syphon, and placed with the curve downwards, and in the bend is to be placed a small portion of mercury, not sufficient to close the connexion between the two legs; a solution of nitrate of silver is then to be introduced until it rises in both limbs of the tube. The precipitation of the mercury in the form of an arbor Diana will then take place, slowly only when the syphon is placed in a plane perpendicular to the magnetic meridian, but if it be placed in a plane coinciding with the magnetic meridian, the action is rapid, and the crystallization particularly beautiful, taking place principally in that branch of the syphon towards the north. If the syphon be placed in a plane perpendicular to the magnetic meridian, and a strong magnet be brought near it, the precipitation will recommence in a short time, and be most copious in the branch of the syphon nearest to the south pole of the magnet. pieces are cemented together by caoutchouc dissolved in coal tar oil, the adhesion is such that when the two are torn asunder in the dark, there is a bright flash of electric light, similar to that produced by separating plates of mica, by breaking Rupert's drops, or by breaking barley-sugar, or sugar-candy. Upon trying this experiment with different substances, it was found that flashes of light were distinctly produced, by tearing quickly a piece of cotton cloth.-Edin. Jour.x. 185. Rectification of the Compass.-The Board of Longitude has voted the sum of 5002 to Mr. Peter Barlow, for his simple invention for correcting the local attraction of ships. It consists of a plate of iron abaft the compass, which being regulated so as to correct the effects of the ship in any one place, does the same in all places. This mode of avoiding error must be of incalculable value to navigation. Preparation of Kermes Mineral.-According to M. Fabroni, a much finer kermes mineral is obtained by using tartar in place of the alkali employed in the usual process. Three or four parts of tartar should be mixed with one part of powdered sulphuret of antimony, and heated red in a crucible until the cessation of fumes indicates that the tartar is all decomposed; the mass is then to be dissolved in hot water, filtered, and left to cool, when abundance of fine. kermes will be deposited, of a very deep colour. The abundance of kermes thus. F. 1. P. obtained does not at all interfere" with' the quantity and beauty of the golden 6 sulphuret, afterwards obtained by the addition of acid to the mother liquor.-Ann. 0de Chim xxv. 7. Levels in London above the highest Water mark, T J 19 7 35 6 27 0 0 52 0 0 13 3 0 49 8 0 South of Berners Street Palimpsest MSS-An interesting paper was read at the Royal Literary Society lately, by Archdeacon Nares, upon the subject of Palimpsest MSS. so denomi46 7 0 nated from Tax and yaw, to cleanse 61 4 0 or wipe, because the parchment on which 65 0 0 they are written had been cleansed of the 74, 30 first writing, and used from motives of 594 Oeconomy for a second. This cleansing 76.00 or erasure, however, not being complete, 70 4 0 the earlier writing has been frequently 80 10 0 detected under the later, and thus valu77 20 able ancient fragments have been brought 72 3 0 to light. The Ancients themselves had their Palimpsests. These were of a dif ferent kind, however-leaves or books so prepared that one writing could easily be expunged to make way for another, and they were employed by authors for correcting their works, &c. (See Plutarch De Garrul.-Catullus, Carm. 22.-and Cicero, Ep. ad Fam.) and could never hide any valuable matter. The modern palimpsests, on the contrary, have opened Opposite South End of King St.. Electricity on Separation of Paris. 15 to. to us some great discoveries; and promise many more. The first Rescript MS. of which any important use was made, was (it is believed) the Codex Ephrem, or Codex Regius of Paris, now in the Royal Library, (No. 9.) The latter writing consists of 209 leaves confusedly placed, and containing certain works of the Syrian Ephrem, in Greek; but the more ancient have had the whole of the appears Old and New Testament, in Greek charac ters held by the learned to belong to the 6th or 7th century. Some collations of the N. T. have been obtained from this -the Old still remains unexplored. The next great discovery recorded is of UIphilas, Bishop of Gothland, who in the fourth century invented a new character, and translated the whole scriptures into it from the Greek. Portions of this work (long lost, with the exception of the four gospels preserved in the Codex Argenteus at Upsal) were found in 1775, in the Augustan Library at Wolfenbuttel, under a more modern MS. of the Origines of Isidorus. The MS. of Isidorus in fact, consisting of 330 leaves, was made up of portions of several older books, and among the rest a fragment of Galen, probably the oldest known MS, of a medical book.-The next investigator of this class of MSS. was Paul James Bruns, the coadjutor of Kennicott in his great work of the Hebrew Collation. He discovered at Rome, in 1773, a fragment of the 91st book of Livy, in a Rescript MS. of the Vatican library. This was published, and has been admitted into the later editions of the historian. It contains part, and it is to be lamented only a small part of the war with Sertorius in Spain. Bruns afterwards investigated the Bodleian Library, and published in 1782-3-4, an ac count of the Palimpsests it contained. Yet, notwithstanding these remarkable successes, no other publication of this nature appeared till 1801, when Dr. Barrett, of Trinity College, Dublin, produced his Gospel of St. Matthew, from a Rescript in the Library of that College. it appears to have been rewritten in the 12th or 13th century, upon portions of much more ancient books. " But Signor Angelo Maï has been the great discoverer in this way, in our own times. In 1813, he translated anonymously a large part of an Oration of Isocrates de Permutatione; and in 1814, appeared as a public labourer among Pa limpsests. His first work was " Certain hitherto unpublished Orations of Cicero, viz. those for Scaurus, Tullius, and Flac * From being chiefly written in letters of silver. cus." These Orations had been written This In a Palimpsest volume, containing various treatises of St. Augustine, he found the long lost books of Cicero de Re Publica.-The history of these extraordinary successes in this peculiar line of research will, as the learned Archdeacon earnestly impressed, stimu I M M vc A republication has taken place at Paris of the Fragments on Roman Law, discovered by the laborious and learned Angelo Mai, in a palimpsest MS. in the Vatican. The titles of these fragments are, De Empto et Vendito; De Usu Fructu; De Dotibus et Re Uxoria; De Excusatione; Quando donator intelligatur revocasse voluntatem; De Donationibus ad legem Cinciam; De Cognitoribus et Procuratoribus. Unfortunately, numerous chasms in the manuscript have not permitted the developement of the whole of the author's observations on the above important subjects. M. le Comte Orloff, the Russian senator, amateur in all that is scientific and literary, and during several years a resident in France, has just published a work in three volumes, entitled, Voyage dans une partie de la France. It is written in the form of letters, and is both interesting and instructive. A new literary journal is announced for the month of May-" Revue Européenne, ou productions de l'esprit humain en France, en Angleterre, en Italie, en Allemagne." The publication is to be monthly, and in bulk about ten sheets 8vo. It proposes to give information of all the works published, discoveries made, progress ascertained, &c. in the arts and sciences in every country of Europe; and is to be published in English at London, French at Paris, Italian in Italy, German in Germany, &c. Already the contributors and editors are appointed. In France, MM. Arnault, Jouy, Jay, and Etienne; in other words, the liberal coterie litteraire of Paris are named as the chief writers in the French department of this European ✓ enterprize. A young French poet, who possesses an astonishing facility, proposes to improvise publicly, in French, something very extraordinary,-a Tragedy in five acts, and a grand Opera in three acts. This young man, M, Eugène de Pradel, has but just left Sainte Pelagie, where he has been imprisoned during five years for political opinions. During these five years he has applied closely to study, and has published several works in prose and in verse. ITALY. Ignazio Vescovalli, the well known dealer in works of art, has built a rotunda behind his house, which he has adorned with the best statues and busts in his magazine. Among them are the three fauns, which he found in 1822, in digging He has very near St. Lucia, in Selci. judiciously had all the repairs done in plaster of Paris only, a mode which should be generally adopted. Rome has to lament the loss of the Chevalier Tambroni, who died in January. He was a native of Bologna, consul-general of the kingdom of Italy at Rome, and had been intended for some years past for the place of keeper of the imperial gallery of paintings in the Belvedere at Vienna, but never received the decree appointing him. He has written several archæolo gical dissertations, and last summer disGiornale Arcadico loses in him one of its covered the ancient town of Bovilla. The most active contributors, and his friends an agreeable and well informed compa nion. SICILY. Sicilian Literature.-In 1821 and 1822, only about fifty-six works were published but it would seem that the list contained in the Bibliothèque Italienne cannot be complete, for there is but one political work, "On the right of Sicily to National Independence," by Baron Fr. Ventura. Sicilian literature is equally poor in its journals. There is a publication called the Iris, a journal of sciences, letters, and arts; but it is not very expensively got up, being principally composed of extracts from foreign journals. Abeille, which served as a Literary Gazette for Sicily, was so badly supported, that it ceased at the twelfth number. The Journal de Médecine, in which are published the observations made at the great hospital of Palermo, may be interesting to the class of individuals for which it is intended. There is no contest in the of the drama. The e career 1822, Sicily produced only two meloIn the years 1821 and dramas. The greater part of the works which issue from the Sicilian presses relate to antiquities and the fine arts. 1824. Foreign Varieties. - Sicily. 209 ersttal to 1Poned 9000 to $g visus ni zplody stel Of the Temples of Selinuntium Two Tia The bero, whose figure is about English architects undertook last summer, 3 feet and a half high, of a robust make, to make excavations in the ruins of the and with the legs quite detached, stands, celebrated Temples of Selinuntiumgmand (as I said, in the middle, with the upper they were rewarded for their trouble by part of the body turned to the spectator; the discovery of a great many works of but the legs and thighs quite in profile, sculpture, architectural fragments, and so that the feet are placed one before the painted ornaments. One of these artists other in a parallel direction. The head died at Selinuntium, of a fever caused by/ has al smiling affected expression, partithe heat, exertion, and bad air; and as cularly in the mouth; has no beard; and soon as the government was informed of the one eye which is still preserved, seems the success of the excavations, it took to be shut, if, or at least to be but very little possession of all the works that were open. "The hair is regularly curled on the found. When brought to Palermo, the forehead The body, in which a prodifragments were added to the little collec- gious fulness of the parts which give the tion of the University, where there is also hero his epithet is observable, and in a part of the antiques previously obtained which it agrees with the figures on the from the ruins of Tyndaris, by Mr. ancient Sicilian vases, appears to be quite Faghan, an Englishman. As I had al- naked, and we see only the short sword ready heard, both at Rome and Naples, hanging across the back, while the belt is of these Selinuntium sculptures, I has- merely indicated by a stripe over the tened, on my arrival here, to visit them; breast, painted red. He has one hand and will give you a short description, upon his breast, and with the other holds which I shall perhaps be able to render one of the side figures. These hang down more complete, when I shall have seen perfectly alike and regular on the right and examined the ruins where they were and left, with bent knees, and hands found. The works belong to the remains crossed upon the breast. The arm of Herof two Doric Temples, one of which is cules is thrown round the one on the left, within the citadel, or acropolis; and the so that the hand above the knees is less other without, at a place now called I visible; the right-hand figure, however, Pilori Besides a great number of small has only the heel on the shoulder of the fragments, such as hands, feet, pieces of hero; but we do not see the lance, which, drapery, and four heads, three bas-reliefs according to the narrative of Tzetzes, have been found, which are presumed to be keeps it balanced. The heads are very Metopes. All these works are of a pretty ill formed, and besides mech injured by compact lime-stone, or tuffa, which has the effects of the air. The hair is not so however suffered considerably in many regularly curled, and three braids hang on places, from the influence of the atmo- each side of the head. Both figures are sphere. The style is that of the old Greek likewise quite naked; only bands, or fetSchool; and, though I will not here ven- ters, are to be seen above the instep and ture to determine accurately the time or above the knees. Though in all these place, they evidently have a considerable figures there is no trace of character, resemblance to the celebrated Ægina Sta- properly so called, of beauty of form or of tues. The workmanship, however, is far expression, yet we remark the rude be*moré rude, the attitudes much more un- ginnings of that style, the strict and connatural, and the forms much more con- sequent developement of which was to ventional. Of the three Metopes, as they lead Grecian art to the highest summit of are called, two are so far preserved, that perfection, together with the regular, and. no doubt remains, on the whole, as to as it were, architectural disposition of the their original measure and form. The works of sculpture, which serve as ornathird, however, appears to have been ments to buildings. The second Metope brought to the same size and shape by represents Perseus, who is cutting off the repairing. The two Metopes are flat, but head of Medusa, in which he is assisted by have above and below a square plate; the Minerva. The hero of Mycene is also in lower one upon which the figure stands the middle of the piece: the head and the belongs to the architrave, and the upper upper part of the body fronting the specto the cornice. The lower band (plate) tator, and the lower part in profile. On is 94 inches high, the metope 3 feet 8 his head he has the winged hat upon reinches, and the upper band about 8 inches gular hair. The expression of the counhigh; the projection of the band on which tenance is also that of a peculiar smile, the figures stand is about 6 inches. This and the eyes are entirely closed, as the first piece contains three figures, which action requires. The armour is not to be undoubtedly represent Hercules Melam- observed, but from the middle of the body pyges, which is the middle figure, and down towards the knees hangs a regularly Passalus and Alkmon, the two sons of plaited piece of drapery. On the legs are VOL. XII. NO. XLI. 2 E |