cordial gratitude for the addition which he has made to our stock of knowledge, by his Grammar and Dictionaries; and we are confident that every student who is learning the French language, if he take these works as his guide, will agree with us, that the industry and ingenuity of Mr. Dufief, have converted a rugged road into a path of velvet smoothness.

MINERALOGY.

Observations upon a Chromat of Iron, found on the Estate of Thomas Rutter, Esq; in the vicinity of Baltimore.

THE chromat of Iron has been found in tolerable plenty in France within these ten years or less; but it has not been noticed by the German minerallogists until very lately.Jameson describes a steel-gray acicular chromat of Iron, with a yellow tarnish, and a green chrome-ochre, but our Baltimore mineral is not described by him. In France (Department of Var,) it is accompanied, as with us, by Steatite.

I believe M. Godon, the minerallogical lecturer, first noticed our mineral. He and Mr. Peale prepared a yellow pigment from it, which, although they sold it at two dollars per ounce, was all bought by the chair painters and sign painters in Philadelphia. But the profit, probably, does not compensate the trouble-for they make no more. It is certainly the most beautiful yellow pigment which is known. Their mode of preparing it I do not know; but it may be prepared thus :-Prepare a strong solution of lead in nitrick acid; take care the acid is saturated with the lead; filter it; bruize the chromat of iron into a fine powder; mix with it three-fourths of its weight of pure nitre (refined saltpetre,) also in powder; expose them to a strong red heat, approaching to fusion, in a covered crucible, for an hour; wash the contents of this crucible in boiling rain water; filter; evaporate gently till a slight pellicle begins to appear on the furnace, or till the solution is about three ounces in quantity to one

ounce of nitre employed. With this solution, which will be a combination of the chronic acid with the alkali of the tartar, precipitate the solution of lead. The chromat of pot-ash will be decomposed; the chromat of lead will fall down in a bright yellow powder, and the supernatant liquor will be a solution of common nitre. The yellow powder must be collected on a filter, washed and dried on a chalk stone in the usual way.

In France, the chromic acid, procured either from the chromat of Iron, or the red chromat of lead of Siberia, is now used to give a green colour to glass, enamels, and porcelain, and is said to produce, by fusion, the finest green yet known. I presume the acid procured in Vaugelin's method by the decomposition of the red chromat of mercury, artificially prepared, much in the same manner with the abovementioned chromat of lead, is ground up with glass of borax, and used as a pigment on the substance to which it is to be united by fusion at the surface.

It has begun to be used as a mordant in callico printing, wherein art has not yet been able to furnish a simple green; that is, a green that will stand washing and acids, from one substance. How far this improvement has been carried, I do not know.

It is said that Mr. W. Hembell, of Philadelphia, has succeeded in procuring a still finer yellow than Godon and Peale, but I do not know his process.

I have seen a very fine specimen of a chromat of iron discovered in Chester County, Pennsylvania, by a Mr. Smith, formerly of Philadelphia.

0.

PACUVIUS TAURUS, in hopes of obtaining a present from Augustus, told him, "It was commonly reported that he had received a considerable sum from him."-" But I would not have you believe it," said the emperor.

MACROB. Saturn.

247923

POETRY.

DANAE FROM THE GREEK OF SIMONIDES.

Extracted from the Memoirs of Anacreon. M. S.

1805.

When the wild winds whistled by
And midnight gloom o'erhung the sky:-
When old Ocean's foaming tide
Impetuous, dash'd the vessel's side:-
Danae view'd the fearful deep

And clasp'd her child, now bath'd in sleep.
"Alas! my child, while all around,
Darkness and sad dismay are found;
I hear the angry billows roar,
And idly lash the distant shore:
I see the vivid lightning play
Making, of night a fearful day:

And while each hour wakes new alarms,
Thou sleep'st sweet babe, upon my arms.
No guilty pang disturbs thy heart;
No grief has bade thy tears to start.
But could the surge that wets thy hair
Awake thy bosom to despair,
And make thee feel what I deplore,

I then would bid thee sleep the more.
But oh! Great Jove! in future years,
When all the man my boy appears, *
Oh! give him valour bold and strong,
That he may 'venge his mother's wrong!"

* Perseus-See Lempriere's Dict.

SEDLEY

SONNET-TO WINTER.

A wrinkled crabbed man they picture thee,
Old WINTER, with a ragged beard as grey
As the long moss upon the apple tree;

Close muffled up, and on thy dreary way,
Blue lipt, an ice drop at thy sharp blue nose,
Plodding alone thro' sleet and drifting snows.
They should have drawn thee by the high-heapt hearth,
Old WINTER! seated in thy great arm'd chair,
Watching the children at their Christmas mirth,
Or circled by them as their lips declare
Some merry jest, or tale of murder dire,

Of troubled spirit that disturbs the night,
Pausing at times to stir the languid fire,

Or taste the old October brown and bright.

THE COMPLIMENTS OF THE SEASON.

AN IMPROMTU.

'Tis WINTER! and Winter's enough in all reason,

Without complimenting us on his cold season;
Yet all who now meet, friend, acquaintance and brother,

Are determined on congratulating each other.

But what are the gifts that old Winter has given,
Whilst far from our shores softer seasons are driven?

To one he obligingly sends a rheumatic,

While another is pleasingly plagued with sciatic;
To one, of the tooth-ache he sends a small smack,
And amuses another with pains in his back :
To this, in his goodness, a cough he despatches,

Whilst his colds are dispensed in delightful large batches:
And chilblains, catarrhs, dismal head-aches, and sneezings,
Are the compliments sent with old Winter's sharp freezings!
NO. 2.-VOL. 1.

N

ON PERUSING THE LADY OF THE LAKE.

SCOTIA! erst in battle proved,

Whose hardy chieftains war beloved,
With mighty arm, from mountain height,
Pour'd down the tempest of the fight,
Till Southern bands in terror fled,
And every foe man hid his head;
A prouder garland decks thee now,
Than ever graced a warrior's brow!
Love and beauty, sweetly smiling,
Valiant chief, and cloister'd nun,
Crown the bard, whose song beguiling,
All the praise of verse hath won.

Scotia! well may mists enshroud
Thy mountains in impervious cloud,
If Genius shine on thee so bright
And shed on thee his floods of 'light.
Well may rough rocks thy clime deface,
Since twining round thy rugged base,
And shooting from their cliffs so high,
Grow all the flowers of Minstrelsy.

Harp of the North-Thy strains prolong,
And every note shall echo bear,

Till every valley find a tongue,

And every mountain stoop to hear!

Lo! touched by life inspiring rhyme,
Awake the chiefs of elden time,
Oblivion's massy bars unfold,

And all is new, that late was old.

The mould'ring warrior grasps his glaive,

And lances break, and banners wave;

And modern eyes astonished see,

The faery forms of Chivalry.