PUBLICATIONS RECEIVED.

BOOKS.

The Birds of Jamaica. By Philip Henry Gone; assisted by Richard Hill Esq., of Spanish Town. History of Greece. By George Grote, Esq. Volumes III. and IV. Friends in Council; a Series of Readings and Discourse thereon. Book the first.

Tracey, or the Apparition; a Tale of the Last Century. By Mrs. Thomson, Author of" The Chevalier," &c. In three volumes.

Gleams of Thought reflected from the Writings of Milton, Sonnets and other Poems. By Lord Robertson. Robin Hood; a Fragment. By the late Robert Southey, and Caroline Smithey. With other Fragments and Poems. By B. S. and C. S. The Unseen World; Communications with it, Real or Imaginary; including Apparitions, Warnings, Haunted Places, Prophecies, Aerial Visions, As- trology, &e. [The subject of The Unseen World is the philosophy of apparitions, or rather of communications between disembodied spirits and souls yet in the flesh. Strictly speaking, the writer goes further than this; entering into portents, or what sen- sible persons consider natural phrenomena twisted by ignorance or superstition into signs and omens, from the cross in the heavens of the age of Constantine down to the death-lights of a modern village. These topics are discussed in dialogues between various persons. The style is very elegant; having all the ease, force, and finish of the best writers of the Tractarian schooL The open conclusions of the author are not singular; but they would seem to be either a pious fraud to enable him to insintt- ate another opinion' or, as is the case with many persons on supernatural topics, his feelings are too strong for his reason. At all events, while his mere coneltn- sions contain little or nothing to be generally objected to, the effect of the whole is to lead the reader to incline to the troth of the most idle tales of superstition. In this sense, the logic may be called dexterously insidious; but considered as reasoning, it is exceedingly poor. The most ill-supported stories, delusions evi- dently nervous natural phienomena, and narratives with suspicion on the very face, are put forward, not indeed as authenticated truths, but an effort is made by words, and still more by the tone, to insinuate their probability into the reader; all explanation is carefully shut out; and objections are cleverly put aside, or stopped by an appeal to our ignorance of the Divine intentions. In a literary and jesuitical point of view, The Unseen World is a very able book: it is curious, as bringing together nodes distinct heads the different kinds of alleged supernatural appearances, or what may be tortured into such; and it has some very powerful descriptions of natural scenery: but its covert tendency is to revive the exploded superstitions of ignorant and credulous ages.] Mind and Matter. Illustrated by Considerations on Hereditary Insanity and the Influence of Temperament in the Development of the Passions. By J. G. Millingen M.D.,M.A., First Class Surgeon to the Forces, &c. &c.; Author of " The Millingen, of Medical Experience," &c. CDr. Millingen is well known as an agreeable and gossipy medical writer, who adds to a wide range of carious reading, a popular knack in selecting and presenting remarkable facts, without greatly troubling himself about the evidence on which they rest, or how far exceptional instances can support a general conclusion. Such a character of mind is not well adapted for difficult physical and metaphy- sical discussions on the connexion and reciprocal influence of soul and body; nor does Dr. Millingen succeed very well in Mind and Matter. He culls a great many .particular facts, and 'advances some physiological principles, to show that dispositions are hereditary or constitutional—that is, are owing to "organisation"; he quotes from all kinds of writers—doctors, philosophers, poets, and essayists= touching the passions, in their natural state and as influenced by civilization; and he gives many curious anecdotes, together with some views of his own. But the genius is unequal to the theme. Dr. Millingen cannot grasp his subject. The end is "a conclusion where nothing is concluded" in the way of reasoning, and little in the way of the author's mere opinion. That the world is governed by fundamental principles—that human perfectibility is a dream—that our passions are greatly influenced by our temperaments, or are descended to us from our pro- genitors—and that there is, according to statistics, an average of evil or crime— is about the extent of Dr. ffillingen's summing-up. He would find a means of improvement, if not a remedy, in education.) The Orphan's Trial; a Tale in Blank Verse. [The "orphan" is the natural daughter of a man of station, brought up from in- fancy by her father and his wife. On their deaths she is intrusted to the gear- dianship of the wife's brother, who spends her income but neglects her: and Lucy's first "trial" consists in her lonely condition; the next, in a passion she entertains for a man apparently above her, but whose equal, so far as wealth is in question, she finally turns out to be. There is a good deal of poetical feeling, with some pretty sketches in The Orphan's Trial; but the workmanship is too elaborated for the materials. The main defect, however, is the unreality of the substance. We may not have met its exact double, but we everywhere see its family likeness, in novels, tales, poems and even annual literature. The writer seems to have poetical feeling enotigh!to produce poetry, provided nature, not books, served for the model. Success might probably be attained in a series of rural sketches.] Select Poetry, chiefly Sacred, of the Reign of King James the First. Col-

lected anctedited by Edward Farr, Esq., Editor of "Select Poetry of the Reign of Queen Elizabeth," &c.

[When selecting his specimens from the age of Elizabeth for the Camden Society, Mr. Farr found so much sacred and serious verse belonging to the time of her successor, that he was induced to pursue his investigations, with the view of form- ing a volume of "Select Poetry, chiefly Sacred, of the Reign of King James the First "; and here it is for the public, not the members of a society only. In suit of his object, Mr. Farr has exhibited much industry; not only gleaning well-known authors, such as Jenson, Donne, Giles and Phineas Fletcher, but from obscure and now unknown writers, some of them anonymous and in mann script. We have little faith in the poetry of forgotten poets, and perhaps there is not tench of real poetry in the volume. Here and there a happy passage will be found; there is often much depth or quaint ingenuity of thought, and often much force of expression: but we find little of that vital animation which seems to separate poetry from prose; and the general style is rugged, with frequent ap- proaches to doggrel. The selection, however, is curious for itself, and useful for the specimens of the one hundred poets here brought together' as well as for the brief biographical notices of each which Mr. Farr has prefixed to the selection.] English Life, Social and Donsestic,in the Middle of the Nineteenth Century,

considered in reference to our Position as a Community of Professing Christians. By the Author of "Reverses."

[English Life is a very respectable book; respectable in object, views, treactment, and literary character. The social and domestic relations are the subject, and their improvement the end of the writer; religion being both her means and her test, though her piety is not of an austere or exclusive cast. The work is divided into two parts; of which the first considers the social relations—amusements, fashion, and the public life of women in connexion with religious and benevolent institutions. The second division discusses marriage and single life, education, home influences, and their reaction on society. The treatment, as we have said, is throughout respectable; the suggestions are sound and practical, and though sometimes seemingly minute, not more so than individual teaching requires; and there are a good many sketches of existing social life, introductory to the pro- posed changes—the narrative of the case before the prescription.] Commentary on the Holy Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles, arranged ac- cording to the Table of Lessons for Daily Service. Designed for Family Reading. By the Reverend Henry Mackenzie, M.A., of Pembroke College, Oxford; Incumbent of Great Yarmouth. [This book contains a series of short commentaries, or very brief sermons in fact, designed to be read in families where the custom of Scriptural readings is adopted, after the lessons for the day, on which the commentaries are based, and whose doctrines or incidents they are designed to illustrate. In treatment the moral lesson is inculcated pretty equally with the pious feeling; but perhaps dogmatic exhortation may predominate a shade too much over explanation. This, however, is matter ot taste; and Mr. Mackenzie distinctly waives all lite- rary or critical merits. He does not aim either at novelty or original learning: the sole object of his book is to be useful and this it is likely to be, to mesa bent of thin Church of England.]

Manual of British Botany; containing the Flowering Plants and Ferns arranged according to the Natural Orders. By Charles Cordele Babing- ton, M.A., F.L.S., F.G.S., &c. Second edition, with many Additions and Corrections.

On the Management of the Skin as a Means of Promoting and Preserving Health. By Erasmus Wilson, FRS., Consulting Surgeon to the St. Pan- cras Infirmary, &c. Second edition. Hydropathy and Homeopathy impartially Appreciated; with an Appendix of Notes illustrative of the Influence of the Mind on the Body. By Ed- win Lee, Esq., Fellow of the Royal Medico-Chirargical Society, &c. The third editions, combined.

[Each of these new editions has been revised and extended by additional matter, but not of a character to admit of distinct enumeration, except the Manual of British Botany, to which a condensed Synopsis of the Natural Orders has been added. Mr. Lee's Hydropathy and Homeopathy combines the two essays in one publication, not in one treatise.]

Cromwell; a Drama, in five acts. By Alfred B. Richards, Esq., Barrister- at-law, of Lincoln's Inn; Author of" Cronus of Lydia; a Tragedy," &c.

SERIAL.

The Poetical Work,s of William Cowper. With a Memoir by Charles Whitehead, Esq. Part L The British Poets. (Library Series.)

LA speculation which if continued as it is begun will deserve encouragement; for we want a popular and uniform edition of the British Poets, of a convenient size, a mat type, and a cheap price. These are combined in the specimen before us: the rise is neither too large nor too small, the " getting up" sufficient, and the cost little-Cowper's Poems, as far as "Charity,, that is about one fifth of the whole, for sixpence.]

ILLUSTRATED WORKS AND PRINTS.

Scotland .Delineated. Part III.

LThis tine work keeps up its character. The present part contains-" The 'Pren- tice Pillar, Roslyn Chapel," the drawing lithographed by J. W. Leitch; "Foot of the West Bow, Edinburgh," by George Cattermole; "Melrose Abbey," by David Roberts; "Edinburgh from Craigleith Quarry," by J. W. Leitch-an unhackneyed view of the city ; "Edinburgh from the Frith of Forth," by Clarkson Stanfield- possessing all the freshness and reality of Stanfield's drawing ; and "Falkland Palace," by David Roberts. The publishers have adopted our suggestion and given an explanatory list of the prints. We would suggest that the list should uniformly contain an explanation of the drawings, alt/tough it may be in- cluded in the current text of the part: the text is too full to be read while merely looking over the illustrations. This remark will apply to the postponed print of Holyrood Palace.]

ChphanhoocL Free-will Offerings to the Fatherless.

[A thin quarto volume of essays and verse, with several illustrations. All the contributions, whether of the pen, the pencil, or the graver, have been gratuitous; the profits of the work being intended as an aid to the Orphan Working School at Haverstock Hill, Hampstead. The nature of the work would exempt it from criticism; but many of the designs poesess a considerable degree of merit: among the artists are Franklin, Absolon, Edward Corboald, Wehnert, and Gilbert. The most satisfactory article in the volume is the long list of subscribers.] Hong-kong. From a Painting by a Chinese Artist. [A. forcibly expressed view of a very interesting place. There is a look of reality

in manner of the print which seems to bespeak fidelity. A doubt occurs, in- deed, how far the lithographer may have translated the Chinese painter into the European style of art ; and if such a process has taken place, of course the de- viations from faithful portraiture may have been considerable. If not, the "Chi- nese artist" displays a knowledge of perspective and artistical effect mach beyond what nis countrymen have credit for.]