PROGRESS OF PUBLICATION.
MR. ALEXANDER WALKER, formerly a lecturer on anatomy and physiology at Edinburgh, has published an interesting treatise on Physiognomy founded on Physiology, illustrated by numerous plates and cuts. The earlier chapters, though too scientific for the general reader, form a useful introduction to a series of curious and acute observations on the physiognomical character of people of different countries, which appeared in Blackwoods Magazine. In tracing the influence of particular professions, Mr. WALKER is unsuccesful ; and his graphic illustrations are not truly charac- teristic. Some of them—the Schoolmaster and Parson, for in- stance—are mere caricatures. In applying his principles to tadi- vidual character, he is more happy and amusing. Those who have been deterred from studying 1..tv.kmit's system by its diffuseness, will find Mr. WALKER'S book a pleasant manual of the science of Physiognomy: which, the author justly observes, is not confined to the thee, but extends to the figure and manner. Mr. WAtitug scouts Phrenology : the phrenologists, we suspect, would wake short work with his oltjections. He gives, nevertheless, plates of the skull as marked by GALL, and the latest umenk;atura of the organs. He accuses both GALL and SPURZHEIM of being "miserably destitute of a knowledge of the brain."
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