On the subject of photometers,' count Rumford's instrument is described, as well as De la Saussure's diaphanometer. Mr. Leslie's instrument measures only the momentary intensities of light; and the reader is referred to Mr. Nicholson's very excellent Journal for an account of it. That light is increased by passing through air, can scarcely be admitted; nor is it probable that latent light should be evolved by the vicinity of other light, even if its connexion with air were allowed; or that it should exist in air, in a latent state, as our authors suggest. We should rather suspect that light may admit of considerable expansion, without any sensible difference of intensity.

The construction of the piano-forte' is explained at some length; and we learn with surprise that this instrument was invented by the poet Mason.

The concluding remarks merit much attention.

As the blow of so light a mallet cannot bring much sound from a wire, it has always been found necessary to have two strings for each note. Another circumstance contributes to enfeeble the sound. The mechanism necessary for producing it makes it almost impossible to give any considerable extent to the belly or sound board of the instrument. There is seldom any more of it than what occupies the space between the tuning pins and the bridge. This is the more to be regretted, because the basses are commonly covered strings, that they may be of a moderate length. The bass notes are also of brass, which has a considerably lower tone than a steel wire of the same diameter and tension. Yet even this substitution for steel in the bass strings is not enough. The highest of them are much too slack, and the lowest ones must be loaded, to compensate for want of length. This greatly diminishes the fulness, and still more the mellowness and distinctness of the tone, and frequently makes the very lowest notes hardly appreciable. This inequality of tone about the middle of the instrument is somewhat diminished by constructing the instrument with two bridges; one for the steel, and the other for the brass wires. But still the bass notes are very much inferior to the treble. It would surely be worth while to construct some piano-fortes, of full size, with naked basses. If these were

made with all the other advantages of the grand piano-forte, they would surpass all other instruments for the regulating power of their thorough bass. We wish that the artists would also try to construct them with the mechanism of mallets, &c. above the sound board. This would allow to it the full extent of the instrument, and greatly improve the tone. It does not seem impossible, nor (we think) very difficult.' Vol. ii. P. 367.

What has been lately added to our knowledge of the plague' is properly detailed under that article, where particular notice is taken of the late fancies of its not being infectious, and the method of curing it by oily frictions. The subject of plants' is again introduced, chiefly to announce Mr. Knight's

experiments, communicated in a late volume of the Philosophical Transactions, and to add some remarks on the nutrition of plants. The latter are however too short, and in some degree imperfect. Carbon, either vegetable or animal, is certainly the chiefly nutritious principle; but in this, as in almost every instance, what appears to be nutritious in a certain proportion is injurious in too large a quantity.

Mr. Knight's method of purifying platina, and rendering it malleable, though somewhat operose and expensive, appears likely to be successful; but it can only be employed for cupels, as the expense must, we think, be too great for the artist on a larger scale.

we have

The article on the centre of position merits commendation for its simplicity and perspicuity. The additions to the article of pottery,' from Vauquelin, and to that of "printing,' containing a description of Mr. Nicholson's printing-press, are particularly useful. Under the article of prison a contrasted view of the penitentiary-houses-as they may be styled--of Philadelphia, and the prisons of Venice, from Dr. Moseley. In the former, the mind is led-as we have expressed it in another article-to reflexion. We fear, in the solitary imprisonment of this country, the mind suffers only, without improvement.-Some additions are made to the article quadrature,' from Mr. Hellins'; and under rickets' we find an account of M. Bonhomme's memoir on this subject, and the use of the calcareous phosphat in that disease. The raja described by Vaillant must have been of immense size; but in this passage the editor suspects a little of the exaggeration of the traveler. Perhaps he has copied too incautiously from him, as we have already observed in the other parts of the

volume.

At

The article of revolution' is a very extensive one. present it is a painful subject; for, on reviewing the whole, whatever may be thought of the original object, or the intentions of the chief movers, their conduct was more injudicious and impolitic than it is easy to conceive. Always too eager or too slow; seldom reaching the object to be attained; anxious to irritate, rather than to conquer-to agitate rather than decide; nothing seems to have been done which the circumstances required. Let us not, however, censure indiscriminately. The coalition was a weapon which required the gi gantic hand of boldness, dexterity, and skill. It was directed by neither: the minor arts of the meanest of professions decided, where the expanded views of the most consummate statesman were necessary; and the spirit which could only determine the property of an acre superintended the drama

where kings should act,

And princes should direct the swelling scene.

The success was proportioned. The author distributes justice to the performers in general, if we except those of our own nation, where, without copying the satires of the day, the historian will some time hence give to each his proper, and to many no very advantageous, character. To Necker, as we have, always said it should be, much of the blame is attributed. Weak, insignificant, and vain, he thought to have wielded an empire, when scarcely able to have presided in a compting-house. To Suwarrof he allots the highest commendations; and we have the opinions of the first generals with us, when we add, that, in his actions, genius and spirit were conspicuously displayed. To Kray also, and to the archduke Charles, no inconsiderable merit is allowed; while to the aulic council, whatever can be conceived of weakness, indecision, perhaps of treachery, is freely, and we fear justly, attributed. Perhaps the coalition with all its efforts could not have succeeded:--under the guidance of its late conductors, success was impossible.

We were

well pleased to see due credit awarded to sir Sidney Smith. His defence of Acre was certainly one of the most brilliant exploits of the war,-in its event, unquestionably the most im portant. In many points the authors, with becoming candor, correct their former errors :-we may, on a future occasion, do the same.

Here then we pause.-Though, perhaps, the whole might have been concluded in the present article, yet we are unwilling to hasten too rapidly; and shall, as in the former ones, no tice shortly the biographical sketches in the pages of the volume we have now passed over.

While we anxiously wait for lord Teignmouth's Life of sir William Jones,' we look with great satisfaction on the abstract before us. It is short, correct, and judicious. Of George Keate,' also, the account is pleasing and satisfactory. Of the unfortunate M. Lamanon,'-who fell a sacrifice to his idolatry of Rousseau, and his veneration for the unsophisticated virtues of savage life,—the account is less original. It is copied chiefly, we perceive, from foreign journals. In the lives of Lavoisier,' of the African traveler Ledyard,' and of Leo X,' we have short, but satisfactory, abstracts of what has been before published. In the biographical sketch of • Leslie,' we have a judicious account of the events of his life; and the author supports the opinion of his having been sent to Bar-le-Duc, to convert the son of James II, by those who wished no impediment to intervene between him and the throne of his ancestors. The Short and easy Method with the Deists,' a work of Leslie's, -attributed to the abbé St. Réal,-introduces some remarks, at least curious and interesting, respecting its originality, and the resemblance of works, certainly written

、

without any communication between the respective authors. Were it proper, we could add some striking facts to the list.

A charge, however, has been lately brought against him of such a nature, as, if well founded, must detract not only from his literary fame, but also from his integrity. "The short and easy Method with the Deists" is unquestionably his most valuable, and apparently his most original work; yet this tract is published in French among the works of the abbé St. Réal, who died in 1692; and therefore it has been said, that unless it was published in English prior to that period, Charles Leslie must be considered as a shameless plagiary.

The English work was certainly not published prior to the death of the abbé St. Réal; for the first edition bears date July 17th, 1697; and yet many reasons conspire to convince us, that our countryman was no plagiary. There is indeed a striking similarity between the English and the French works; but this is no complete proof that the one was copied from the other. The article Philology in the Encyclopædia Britannica, of which Dr. Doig is the author, was published the very same week with Dr. Vincent's dissertation on the Greek verb. It was therefore impossible that either of these learned men, who were till then strangers to each other's names, could have stolen aught from the other; and yet Dr. Vincent's derivation of the Greek verb bears as striking a resemblance to Dr. Doig's as the abbé St. Réal's work does to Charles Leslie's. In the article MIRACLE (Encycl.), the credibility of the Gospel miracles is established by an argument, which the author certainly borrowed from no man, and which the late principal Campbell considered as original; yet within half a year of the publication of that article, the credibility of the Gospel miracles was treated in the very same manner by F. Sayers, M.D. though there is in his dissertation complete internal evidence that he had not seen the article in the Encyclopedia. Not many months ago, the author of this sketch reviewed, in one of the journals, the work of a friend, which was at the same time reviewed in another journal, that at this moment he has never seen. Yet he has been told by a friend, who is much versant in that kind of reading, and knows nothing of his concern with either review, that the book in question must, in both journals, have been reviewed by the same hand; because in both the same character is given of it in almost the very same words!

• After these instances of apparent plagiarism, which we know to be only apparent, has any man a right to say that Charles Leslie and the abbe St. Réal might not have treated their subject in the way that they have done, without either borrowing from the other? The coincidence of arrangement and reasoning in the two works is indeed very surprising; but it is by no means so surprising as the coincidence of etymological deductions which appears in the works of the doctors Doig and Vincent. The divines reason from the acknowledged laws of human thought; the reasonings of the grammarians, with all due deference to their superior learning, we cannot help considering as sometimes fanciful.

But this is not all that we have to urge on the subject. If there be plagiarism in the case, and the identity of titles looks very like it, it is infinitely more probable that the editor of St. Réal's works stole from Leslie, than that Leslie stole from St. Réal, unless it can be proved that the works of the abbé, and this work in particular, were published before the year 1697. At that period, the English language was very little read or understood on the continent; whilst in Britain the French language was, by scholars, as generally understood as at present. Hence it is, that so many Frenchmen, and indeed foreigners of different nations, thought themselves safe in pilfering science from the British philosophers; whilst there is not, that we know, one well authenticated instance of a British philosopher appropriating to himself the discoveries of a foreigner. If, then, such men as Leibnitz, John Bernoulli, and Des Cartes, trusting to the improbability of detection, condescended to pilfer the discoveries of Hooke, Newton, and Harriot, is it improbable that the editor of the works of St. Réal should claim to his friend a celebrated tract, of which he knew the real author to be obnoxious to the government of his own country, and therefore not likely to have powerful friends to maintain his right?

But farther, Burnet, bishop of Sarum, was an excellent scholar, and well read, as every one knows, in the works of foreign divines. Is it conceivable, that this prelate, when smarting under the lash of Leslie, would have let slip so good an opportunity of covering with disgrace his most formidable antagonist, had he known that antagonist to be guilty of plagiarism from the writings of the abbé St. Réal? Let it be granted, however, that Burnet was a stranger to these writings and to this plagiarism; it can hardly be supposed that Le Clerc was a stranger to them likewise. Yet this author, when, for reasons best known to himself, he chose (1706) to depreciate the argument of the Short Method, and to traduce its author as igno rant of ancient history, and as having brought forward his four marks for no other purpose than to put the deceitful traditions of popery on the same footing with the most authentic doctrines of the Gospel, does not so much as insinuate that he borrowed these marks from a popish abbé, though such a charge, could he have established it, would have served his purpose more than all his rude railings and invective. But there was no room for such a charge. In the second volume of the works of St. Réal, published in 1757, there is indeed a tract entitled Méthode courte et aisée pour combattre les Déistes; and there can be little doubt but that the publisher wished it to be considered as the work of his countryman. Unfortunately, however, for his design, a catalogue of the abbé's works is given in the first volume; and in that catalogue the Méthode courte et aisér is not mentioned.' Vol. ii. P. 78.

In the life of Macpherson' the subject of Ossian is revived; and the author seems to acquiesce in what has been styled the authenticity of these poems. He gives up, however, their age, their form, and their being communicated by any other method than oral tradition. On the subject of his history, he laments the apparent duplicity of Sidney, &c. but