710 Monthly Review of Literature. [JuNE. 



THE MICROSCOPIC CABINET. BY ANDREW PRITCHARD. LONDON : WHITTAKER 



& Co. 1832. 



THE object of the present work is to describe a number of select Aquatic Larox 

 of Insects, Crustacea, and Animalcules, and to present accurate delineations of 

 them, as seen through the microscope. The principal merit of the book is this 

 that it selects a variety of living objects that have never been before described, and 

 depicts faithfully many others that have hitherto been most incorrectly represented. 



The plates are beautifully coloured, and the descriptions are elaborately written 

 in a plain and familiar style. The author need not solicit indulgence for any " want 

 of finish" in his writings. 



A very excellent memoir on " the Verification of Microscopic Phenomena," and 

 another " on Microscopes and Engiscopes," occupy a considerable portion of the 

 volume. They are contributed by Dr. Goring, a gentleman in conjunction with 

 whom Mr. Pritchard published the Microscopic Illustrations. 



It will be sufficient to observe, that the present work is in every respect worthy of 

 its predecessor. 



A QUEER BOOK. BY THE ETTRICK SHEPHERD. W. BLACKWOOD, EDINBURGH. 1832. 



MR. HOGG has published so many queer books in his time, that it is somewhat 

 hard upon the present volume to call it by a name to which many of his previous 

 productions have a much better claim. The worthy shepherd has collected into a 

 very seductive and eye-enticing volume, a variety of poems, of all degrees of merit, 

 except the first ; a great many of which we have met with before in Black wood's 

 Magazine, and in the several annuals to which he has contributed. 



Although Mr. Hogg is no more to be compared to Burns, than the latter is to be 



S laced with Shakespeare, yet is the shepherd a man of undoubted genius. It is 

 npossible to read this book without a conviction of his being so. He is gifted with 

 an extraordinary fancy, and with some imagination but the result of their opera- 

 tion is manifested too often with the vague indistinctness of a feverish dream. His 

 colours are vivid, but he draws a poor picture. There is a world of fine things 

 spoiled in every thing that the shepherd attempts, and he has cultivated a sorry and 

 dismal doggrel instead of a significant and harmonious versification. 



Nevertheless, there are many poems in the volume that will repay the reader 

 the expense of the book, and we heartily wish the author success. We fear that 

 the shepherd has hardly found the trade of literature a source of more profit than 

 vexation. If he has, we congratulate him upon it. 



THE BIRDS OF EUROPE, BY I. GOULD. 



THE Birds of Europe form one of the most interesting portions of Ornithology, 

 that can engage the attention of the student. In defining the birds peculiar to 

 our native island, it is difficult, if not impossible, to draw a line, the boundaries of 

 which shall be strictly circumscribed ; but we are, as it were, naturally and una- 

 voidably led by following so many of our own across the channel, as well as by 

 the occasional visits of strangers to our own shores, to break down in our minds the 

 wall of partition, and collect into one view the kindred species thus making our- 

 selves not only acquainted, in a better sense, with our own birds, but enabling our- 

 selves to follow, through a wider circle, the links by which species and genera are 

 connected. Such is the object of the splendid work, the first part of which is now 

 before us ; a work which we have long desired to see, and which could not have 

 been undertaken by an abler individual than the author of " the Century of Birds 

 from the Himalaya Mountains." Beautiful as is that work, it is, we affirm, far 

 exceeded by the present, which moreover possesses the double advantage of giving 

 a sheet of most interesting descriptive letter-press with each plate ; thus pre- 

 senting to the student at once the bird and all that science and research have 

 hitherto ascertained respecting it, together with those original remarks which 

 the author's extensive and accurate acquaintance with the subject, so well qualifies 

 him to offer. 



