rules, and peculiarly regular in all its courses. He explodes vigorously all the absurdities of spontaneous generation, so far, at any rate, as the fungus is concerned. The author is evidently disposed to make as much good as he can out of his subject. But it is impossible for him to deny that the most innocuous amongst them are not without their inconveniences, and that the greater part are associated either with offensive means of injuring the animal frame, or with its death and decay. Apart from this, there is little of interest in the structure of these vegetables. Their forms are not elegant, and they must always remain amongst the least inviting of the productions of nature.

The Sea and its Living Wonders; by Dr. Hartwig. (Longmans.)—We cannot assuredly reckon mist, clouds, dew, and fog, amidst the living wonders of the sea; and yet these are the topics with which Dr. Hartwig commences his volume. The sea is made to include all its relations. On these same subjects the author has gathered together all the scientific gossip of modern times. He tells us all about the Gulf stream-in what predicament we should be without it. It was only the other day that some envious American proposed to ruin Great Britain by cutting a channel for the stream across the isthmus of Darien, turning its course, and thereby freezing us up most inconveniently. The phenomena of tides and currents are described with more frequent reference than in ordinary volumes to these economical effects.

For the living wonders, the author has gathered together all the monstrosities of the deep, and hunted through the pages of all voyagers, ancient and modern, for anecdotes. Of these he has collected a sufficient store; but the diligence of his predecessors had already been great, and there are few which had not already passed into the common domain. But they are selected with taste and described with spirit; and the accumulation is one of the most complete we have. In fact, on its subject, the work is full and comprehensive, and has the double merit of being at once sufficiently scientific and sufficiently intelligible for popular purposes.

The translation is well executed. The book is illustrated, in some respects not very satisfactorily. The proportions are

neglected this perhaps was necessary; but in some instances the drawing is sadly incorrect. Many of the plates, on the other hand, are deserving of great praise. Unquestionably as a digest of the natural history of the ocean, the work stands at the head of its class.

Dædalus; or, the Causes and Principles of the Excellence of Greek Sculpture. By Edward Falkener. (Longmans.)—The modern critic, writing upon ancient art with nothing but ancient ideas about him, runs no small risk of unpopularity, if of nothing worse. We nowadays profess to be able to tell the ancients a vast deal which they did not know about their own business. In sober truth, a critic, to be able to draw a fair comparison between the excellences of the old and the modern styles of art, must free his mind from the prejudices which your thorough classic glories in. The admiration of the more celebrated works of art of antiquity has, with most people, degenerated into simple cant. Mr. Falkener has risen above this; but he is a member of the archæological institute of Rome and Bologna; knows by heart all the collections, museums, and mines in Europe; and is so thoroughly imbued with the notions of antiquity, that he writes more like a Greek explaining his own country to Englishmen, than like an Englishman interpreting Greece. It is only now and then, when he gives his own views on certain ancient structures, that we recognize the modern spirit; and in some of his descriptions of the temples of antiquity, he deviates strangely from his classical models, and allows himself to be carried away by the types of Protestant religious architecture. His idea of the Parthenon is that it was vaulted, and supported by a wooden ceiling; a Gothic interpretation, which would have somewhat astonished an Athenian architect.

On the great question of the superiority of ancient art, Mr. Falkener takes refuge in generalities, and tells us that it is due to a multitude of causes. These he describes in a manner, per se, sufficiently interesting, but without very strictly indicating their bearing upon his theory.

The book is, with all its defects, clever and interesting. The author is full of his subject; and, when that subject is ancient

art, he must be a very unlucky writer who fails of effect. Though neither the anecdotes nor the views are new, they are well introduced; and there is matter concerning the actual manipulation of the ancient artists, which contains information not only of interest, but of value, and, in some instances, hitherto unpublished.

The Pianoforte-its Origin, Progress, and Constitution; by E. F. Rimbault, LL.D. (London: Cochran & Co.)-This book was wanted. The history of the pianoforte is, to some extent, identified with the history of modern society; and no popular account of its progress has yet been published. Something was to be gleaned from cyclopædias and ordinary musical publications, but no complete history of the piano was in existence. Yet the gradations through which the piano has gone were better known, and are of more general interest, than those of any musical instrument. Through all its gradations, this has been beyond question the amateur's instrument, and its development is perhaps of more value, after all, to the general than to the professional reader, who thinks more of the violin, the flute, or the bass viol-instruments almost without a history. Dr. Rimbault has begun at the beginning, and traces the pianoforte through the clavicord, the virginal, the spinet, and the harpsichord, giving of each not only a full description, but a careful enumeration of its powers, and researches into its use and history. Queen Elizabeth and her virginal, of course, appear in this part of the story, which, however, is generally more learned and curious than anecdotal. The connection of the piano with the domestic tastes of England, might have been more completely and forcibly brought under notice, without in any way detracting from the professional merits of the work. The book forms a handsome volume, well printed, and full of illustrations. At the end are a variety of pieces of music, intendedf or the purpose at once of showing the capabilities of the various instruments and their progress. Most of them are very simple, as it is only within the present generation that the powers of the piano, as a substantive instrument, have been fairly tested. The most favourite pieces of our grandmothers, were adaptations of music written for orchestral instruments, and previously very simple airs, with little to recommend them but quiet simplicity-and

not always that. The present work will take its stand among professionals, and will be found occasionally upon the drawing-room table, not, however, so often as it might have been, if more pains had been taken to make it entertaining as well as instructive.

TRAVELS.

Scripture Lands in connection with their History; by the Rev. G. S. Drew. (Smith & Elder.-Mr. Drew interprets literally and locally the scripture prophecies relating to the restoration of the Jews to the Holy Land. He renders every passage in its direct and physical meaning. The restoration is a practical and political restoration,—the Holy land is the geographical Palestine, whither all the scattered children of Jacob are, in the fulness of time, to be collected together, and become subjects of a new, powerful, and prosperous kingdom of Israel. There is, according to his view, nothing symbolical or allegorical in these predictions-no veiled references to a future existence or a spiritual kingdom. The vast changes that have taken place in the physical condition of the earth, and the distribution of mankind over its surface during the twenty centuries that have elapsed since most of these prophecies were written, present to his mind no obstacle to the acceptance of his favourite interpretation. That mere locality, for example, should have ceased to possess any special influence over the destinies either of a particular nation, or of the world in general in these locomotive days, does not suggest any misgiving touching the theory which localizes the restored Hebrew kingdom in a narrow and barren strip of land belonging to the modern Syria. The mere position of this district has also lost its pristine importance. Judea might be considered by, St. Jerome as the demonstrable “umbilicum terræ;" but modern science, in revealing to us the actual configuration of our planet, has told us that the very expression is inaccurate, seeing that the "centre of the world" is at once everywhere and nowhere. Practically, again, travellers find that Judea is not now "a land flowing with milk and honey ;" and we know from its condition of soil, climate, water supply, &c., that it would be an agricultural problem of the most extreme difficulty to endow it with the fertility indicated by the prophetic assu

rances which Mr. Drew has undertaken to elucidate. All these difficulties of course do not countervail, by one feather's weight, the interpretation which assigns to the Hebrew restoration a wholly miraculous design, and regards it as an event predetermined by Providence, in order to carry out His own mysterious purposes. We simply mention these considerations as having been entirely, and perhaps designedly, overlooked by the author. On another point we venture to express a more entire disagreement with his views. While describing the supposed nature and functions of the future Kingdom of Israel, Mr. Drew assigns to the Jews certain very peculiar characteristics and aptitudes. As this is a matter of actual fact, attestable by personal observation, we have less scruple in challenging the accuracy of his statements. The author, for example, asserts, that the Jews, when no longer "homeless wanderers," will become "the bond and the interpreter of the human family." Their fitness for this exalted position, of "carrying on the work of mediation and reconcilement," is deduced from the assumption, that "they present all the signs and tokens of an instrument, which may have the effect of riveting and compacting Christendom together in that conscious oneness which also enters into our expectations of the future. They are masters of all lan

guages; they are at home in the East and the West; they are denizens of all regions in the globe. The temperaments of all races are so blended in their own, that they can interpret between those who cannot naturally sympathize with one another." All this is not now, and never has been, true of the Jews. On many points it is the very reverse of the truth. In stating that the Jew is master of all languages, the author asserts a fact of which he has no certain knowledge. There is no scintilla of proof, for instance, that any Jew has mastered Chinese. But granting that, in the wide dispersion of "the people," some members of the race have taken up their abode in every principal country, and learnt its language, the qualification is but shared with the adventurous Anglo-Saxons, and does not render them peculiarly fitted to act as universal interpreters between the nations of the earth. And, as for the individual faculty of learning foreign tongues, the Russian possesses the endowment in much superior measure to the Jew. As for universal "

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