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Orleannais, the births are to the deaths, as one to five. Monfalcon states similar proportions in other miasmatous districts of France. There is reason to believe the same general fact to be prevailing in the whole district of the Italian Maremmes. 451.

Animals appear also to be affected by miasmatous districts, though not to the same degree as human beings. Dr. M'Culloch gives an enumeration and authorities to this purpose, 454-465. To his authorities, we would add, Lord Somerville's facts and observations on sheep, wool, &c. 3d edit. 1809. p. 23. 93. 100.

Such is our analysis of this well-timed, and important book; for it is impossible for us, after careful perusal, to think or to speak of it otherwise. It may be considered, to a certain degree, as a medical work; but its great importance to the police of health in our own and every other country, induces us to wish that it may be extensively perused, and well reflected on. Dr. M'Culloch may have pushed his notions of the deleterious effects of malaria (miasma) beyond what general observation of the facts will warrant. We are not inclined, for our own part, to impute any needless exaggeration; being well persuaded that his facts are for the most part undeniable, and his conclusions well founded; and the sooner and the more deeply mankind are led to pay more attention than they have yet done to this branch of Hygienne; and to the subjects here discussed, the better it will be for themselves and their posterity.

We have procured and perused Dr. John Crawford's introductory lecture on the cause, seat, and cure of diseases, 1811, and his papers in the first volume of the Baltimore Medical Recorder, 1809. They contain a suggestion of his theory of the animalcular origin of diseases, but few facts or reasonings of weight. We have urged nothing in this review, in any manner derived from his papers or suggestions, or to be found among them.

ART. HI.-Seleccion de Obras maestras dramaticas por Calderon de la Barca, Lope de Vega, y Moreto. Por F. SALES, Instructor en la Universidad de Harvard, en Cambridge. Boston: 1828. 12mo. pp. 255. Selections from the dramatic master-pieces of Calderon de la Barca, Lope de Vega, and Moreto. By F. SALES, Teacher in the University of Harvard, Cambridge. Boston: 1828.

DURING the last twenty years, several attempts have been made to promote, in the rest of Europe, a knowledge of the national

drama of Spain. The translations from Calderon, by A. W. Schlegel, and especially his lectures at Vienna, in 1809, first gave this direction to the curiosity of the lovers of literature. But, it was soon found, that the original theatre of Spain could be understood only by those, who had become familiar with it in its native language and peculiar costume; since it was too separate, idiomatic, and national, to bear translation, or to be fully illustrated by critical discussions. In consequence of this, two editions of Calderon have been for some time going on in Germany, and two selections of old Spanish plays in England, while, at the same time, Spain itself has been, by the curiosity of foreigners, so exhausted of this portion of its printed literature, that its old authors can hardly be obtained at any price; and, in Madrid, where nothing of the kind has been thought of since Huerta published his Teatro in 1784, a reprint of portions of their early dramatists has recently been undertaken, with a good prospect of success.

In our own country, our growing connexion with the Spanish character, and our growing want of the Spanish language, seem to be leading to results somewhat similar. At the south, a constant intercourse with Spanish America, has led to much cultivation of the language, while at the north, where this intercourse is necessarily less frequent, attention has been rather turned to the literature. The effects of both are already visible: many good Spanish books have been reprinted, and among them is to be numbered the volume of plays collected and published by Mr. Sales. It was printed for the use of the under graduates of Harvard College, where Spanish literature is now much cultivated, and consists of three genuinely national dramas, from the period about two centuries since, when the original Spanish theatre was at the summit of its success. The first of these dramas is, El Principe constante-The firm-hearted Prince, by Calderon, which Schlegel, Bouterwek, and Sismondi have praised so much. The second is, La Estrella de Sevilla, the Star of Seville, the best of Lope de Vega's dramas, and which has here the great merit of being reprinted, as it was originally written, and not as it has been uniformly given in Spain and England, with miserable additions and alterations, to accommodate it to the present degraded state of the Spanish stage. The last is El Desden con el Desden, Disdain met with Disdain, by Moreto, a spirited and poetical comedy, of which Moliere has made free use in his Princesse d'Elide. These three pieces, therefore, form an excellent, though certainly a small representation of the immense body constituting the old Spanish drama; and, besides being honourable to their editor, Mr. Sales, whose publications have done much to promote the progress of Spanish literature among us, they constitute a very interesting work for those who wish

deratum, a Geography of Malaria? Those who can afford to travel over Europe, ought to hail with gratitude, any judicious effort, however partial or confined, toward a work so desirable. Ch. 9. On the Geography of Malaria.

The materials for this chapter, are furnished by the scanty and accidental hints of travellers. For the whole of the remarks concerning the Mediterranean, Dr. M'Culloch acknowledges himself indebted to Captain Smyth, in his accounts of Sicily, Sardinia, and the Mediterranean shores.

Malaria districts will, in the first place, comprise the alluvions of the Oronoko, the Mississippi, the Euphrates, the Ganges, the Danube, the Congo, and similar places.

It will embrace all the smaller alluvions, of the Po, the Rhone, and all other known rivers, more or less in proportion to their liability to alternations of moisture and dryness, from the rivers themselves, as the valleys of Cochin China, Ava, and Egypt; the Jungles of the east, whether of Bamboo or Mangrove; the river swamps, and alluvions of the Carolinas, Georgia, Mobile, &c..

Every place where water accumulates for want of drainage, whether the locality be extensive or confined, as the swamps of Hungary, the Lyonnais, the fenny regions and mosses of England, and the numerous low and moist lands of our own Atlantic country, throughout the extent of the eastern shore; the margins of lakes, whether of Italy, of our Genesee country, or the great lakes of Erie, Ontario, and Superior.

For the enumeration of sickly localities in Italy and Greece, we must refer to our author, p. 373, et seq. We are a very travelling people in the United States, full as much so as the English; and to those who incline to take the tour of France, Spain, Italy, and Greece, we recommend the account which Dr. M'Culloch has here presented to us, throughout the whole of this interesting chapter. We know of no subject which ought to occupy the attention of travellers, who mean to publish their observations, so much as that now in question. Nor does it require an education absolutely medical. It will suffice, if the general notions contained in the book now before us, be well considered; and that the persons who would profit by this knowledge, should keep their eyes open to observation, and their ears to authentic information. A traveller who, in the present day, wilfully neglects these observations and inquiries, does not possess the requisites which the publie have a right to expect.

Ch. 10. Of the nature of Malaria.

"That the poison of marshes consisted in animaculæ, invading the body through the lungs, sometimes, I presume, through the stomach also, is a speculation that dates as high as Lucretius, Varro, and Columella; which seems to have been renewed in the days of the Microscope, by Kircher and some others, and appears naturally enough to have found favour with Linnæus.

"Volta must be allowed the merit of the first experiments and the first suggestions of the chemical theory of malaria. Naturally enough also, these philosophers sought the poison in question, among the ascertained chemical gasses. Among these are found the names of Baumes, Orfila, Chevreuil, Textoris, Balme: and that the accused gasses have been carbonic acid, azote, hydrocarburetted gas, hydrophosphuretted gas, hydrosulphuretted gas, and even ammonia, to say nothing of a yet undiscovered compound of azot and oxygen, called septon.

"But justice must now be done to those who have attempted, by means of analysis which modern chemistry furnishes, to examine the air produced by marshes, and to inquire whether it did not really contain some peculiar volatile substance or compound, and unknown gas, the true source of the evil; since I need not say that the known ones which have been enumerated, are not the poison in question, inasmuch as they can be applied to the body in the laboratory more effectually than nature can ever furnish them, without exciting fevers.

"The eudiometrical experiments of Gattoni, and Moschati, produced no results, as might have been anticipated. A more rational method of experimenting, and for a different object, was attempted by De Lisle, Vauquelin, Julia, Breschi, and others; and if the problem could have been solved by the analytical powers of modern chemistry, we might have expected the solution from the hands of Vauquelin. It is unnecessary to detail failures, and equally so to describe the nature of the attempts, though rationally conducted. What was considered as animal matter, was found repeatedly in the condensed dew of the grounds in question. But how far this fact may be connected with what is sought, we can scarcely conjecture. Malaria, like contagion, like odours, remains a problem for future chemistry; nor must we blame those who have been unable to produce results without means." p. 422.

In the following pages, Dr. M'Culloch still adheres, however, to the notion, that malaria, or miasma, is a poisonous GAS; and thinks it is decomposable by the sun, pages 110, 266, 270, 276, 292, 424, 467.

Upon this obscure subject, we do not pretend to offer a suggestion that ought to be deemed any thing more than probable. But while the whole matter is in reality involved in such acknowledged obscurity, any suggestions of a plausible character relating to it, cannot be considered as out of time, or at present out of place.

Our own opinion is the exploded one, that miasma is animalcular: we shall endeavour to show, 1st. That it is not a gas. 2dly. That it is not a mere odour or effluvium. 3dly. That the phenomena can be explained on the theory of animalculæ.

As to the first point; it is not a Gas.

Many of the ablest chemists now living, have anxiously made experiments in a variety of situations on miasmatous air, for the purpose of ascertaining this point expressly. The result has uniformly been, that the air examined, contained no other constituent gas than the atmosphere usually contains.

It is conceded, even by Dr. M'Culloch, that none of the known gasses are miasma. It is not carbonic acid, nor hydrocarburet,

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M. Julia made sixty experiments on the marshes of Cuch near Narbonne, the pond of Pudre near Sigean, of Salces and Salanque in Roussillon, of Capestang near Bezieres, and the different marshes of the coast of Cette, without result. As to septon, it is no where to be found but in Dr. Mitchell's Lexicon.

either to make themselves familiar with the idiomatic portions of the Spanish language, or the genuine and fearless spirit of the elder Spanish poetry.

In reading this volume, therefore, our thoughts have been naturally turned to the vast mass of the racy Spanish drama, produced between 1590 and 1700; or between the time when Lope de Vega took possession of the theatre, and the time when the Bourbon family finally crushed whatever of national spirit and poetical enthusiasm had survived the despotism of the last princes from the house of Austria. But, of this interesting portion of literary history, we have found no distinct or.sufficient accounts. What is in Schlegel, Bouterwek, and Sismondi, is imperfect, partly from want of the dramatists themselves, and partly from want of familiarity with the country that produced them, and whose impress and character they so distinctly bear. These are deficiencies which cannot be soon or easily supplied, Many of the needful materials are irrecoverably lost, so that Moratin, the comic poet, now alive, who was long employed on the subject, seems to have given it up in despair. Many more of the materials can be found only in Spain, and only in manuscripts; and all are every where obtained with difficulty. Still, the subject is so curious and interesting, that we will venture to give some of the notices which we have collected, not with the thought of forming a history of the early Spanish drama; but in the hope of being able to excite some attention to its peculiar spirit and characteristics, and to recommend it earnestly to the lovers of Spanish literature in our own country. The earliest form of the drama was the same in Spain, that it was in France and England;-that of pantomimes to set forth the scenery of the Holy Sepulchre, of the Nativity, and of the great events connected with the first appearance of Christianity. The first notice we have met of these exhibitions, is in the remarkable body of laws compiled by Alonzo the wise, between 1256 and 1263,-the famous Partidas-in which it is declared that "the clergy ought not to join in such idle and lewd exhibitions, nor permit them to be represented in the churches; but rather, that they should make devout representations of the birth of our Lord, and how the angels came to the shepherds and told them he was born; and of his advent, and how the Magi kings came to worship him; and of his resurrection; how he was crucified and rose the third day." From all which we learn, that pantomimic exhibitions of subjects drawn from those portions of our religion, which have sometimes been called its mysteries, were common in Spain in the middle of the thirteenth century, as they were elsewhere in Europe, and that in their original and more decent form, they were considered devout exercises, fit to be exhibited in the churches by priests, for the edification of the people. But the circumstances of the times, did not, in Spain, as

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