564 



at the first pot-house they stepped 

 into. 



The Essay on Phrenology is exceed- 

 ingly feeble. We have no doubt but 

 every periodical that has opposed Phre- 

 nology, and that is nearly all, would 

 furnish articles immeasurably superior 

 with better information, ana more 

 thoroughly reasoned. One upon astro- 

 nomy, of some length, is much better. 

 Mr. G. calls in question the evidence as 

 to the distances of the fixed stars par- 

 ticularly, and of course the deductions 

 that have been made of endless systems, 

 corresponding with our own, in the end- 

 less regions of space. There can be 

 little room for doubt, but the men of 

 glasses and figures are peremptory upon 

 evidence, which would not, in other 

 matters, prompt them to wag a finger. 



Illustrations of the Literary History of 

 the 18th Century, $c. a sequal to the Li- 

 terary Anecdotes, by John Nicholls, vol. 

 F/. Another volume, or rather, like 

 Colman's fat hero, two single volumes 

 rolled into one, for it only wants two 

 leaves of 900 pages, consisting still of 

 but a small portion of the immense 

 streams of memoirs poured from all 

 quarters into the reservoirs of the elder 

 Nicholls. By him the bulk of the ma- 

 terials were accumulated, but he dropt 

 his mantle on his son and his grandson 

 the present respectable printers of the 

 same name and they are evidently as 

 indefatigable, in the same way, as their 

 industrious ancestor. GifFord, Lord 

 Camelford (the first lord of that name), 

 the Earl of Buchan, Mr. Samuel Den- 

 nis, Baptist Noel Turner, are the chief 

 names that shine most brilliantly inter 

 minores. Lord Camelford's letters are 

 written with a good deal of vivacity 

 chiefly on public affairs, and quite read- 

 able ; but we cannot affirm so much of 

 the multitudinous epistles of Mr. Sam. 

 !Dennis confined as they are, for the 

 most part, to professional gossip who 

 gets this preferment, and who is to have 

 that. But numbers figure here that can 

 never flourish elsewhere ; but then there 

 are numbers also, who are gratified by 

 reading such notices, either from per- 

 sonal recollections, or from occasional re- 

 ports, and glad to catch some authentic 

 account of their obscure career. The 

 intrinsic value of the communication is 

 but small ; but that is not what the pub- 

 lication aims at if the parties had been 

 more capable of serving posterity, as well 

 as their own generation, they would 

 not have been reserved for commemora- 

 tion in a limbo of this kind. 



Among these illustrious obscure, we 

 met with the name of Hellins, and were 

 ourselves glad to see a memoir of a man 

 we remember well. He was a most in- 

 defatigable operative in mathematics, 



Monthly Review of Literature, 



[MAY, 



and in the town of Stony Stratford- 

 near his own residencehad the further 

 reputation of being a most profound as- 

 trologer, and was occasionally consulted, 

 we believe, by the natives on the mat- 

 ter of their horoscopes. Of the hum- 

 blest origin, he had worked himself into 

 knowledge had got into orders, and 

 into a small vicarage, where he laboured 

 at his desk to his last breath honest 

 and honourable in all the duties of life, 

 but as ignorant of nature and of society 

 as a monk. Believing his merits un- 

 kindly overlooked, he indulged a sar- 

 castic humour, which found a gratifi- 

 cation in snarling at mankind ; but that 

 quite in the abstract. Those who knew 

 him, knew him to be kind and faithful, 

 and one that would have gone to the ex- 

 tent of his limited means to serve his 

 friends. He had star-gazed for Maske- 

 lyne at Greenwich, and was deeply mor- 

 tified at not being appointed his succes- 

 sor. Sir Joseph Bankes did not think 

 him a sufficiently fine gentleman, and 

 nominated Pond, who has realized Hel- 

 lins's prognostic. The present first 

 Lord or the Admiralty was, if we recol- 

 lect rightly, his last pupil for a few 

 months. 



Lucius Carey ; or the Mysterious Fe- 

 male of Mora's Dell, an Historical Tale, 

 by the Author of the Weird Woman, 4 vols. 

 Now and then we have met with a 

 story coming forth under Mr. Newman's 

 auspices, not at all inferior to some of 

 loftier pretensions, ushered in, in the 

 most imposing form, by the most fashion- 

 able publishers. But Lucius Carey can 

 never figure among them. We perse- 

 vered, in spite of numerous indications 

 of ignorance both as to historical facts 

 and characters, in the hope of some 

 favourable turn, but it proved labour lost. 

 The writer has neither common tact 

 nor executive power for a tale of any 

 complication. Lucius Carey, himself, 

 is the nephew of Lord Falkland joins 

 the royal army fights with Cromwell, 

 and even wounds him, at least scratches 

 his nose, and with difficulty escapes 

 hanging from the magnanimous resent- 

 ment of the said Cromwell. The story 

 is mixed up with the fortunes of a young 

 lady the mysterious female of Mora's 

 Dell deprived of her estates by a wick- 

 ed lord, her uncle ; but finally by the 

 aid of witches and warlocks and con- 

 jurors, and Cromwell himself, the great 

 conjuror of his day, we believe at last 

 she gets her own again, and of course 

 Lucius Carey gets also her lovely self 

 and her broad lands. But the confusion 

 of the whole story is past all disentangle- 

 ment, and may be safely pronounced 

 unreadable. 



The Boole nfthe Seasons, by W. ffowitt. 

 Mr. Howitt has made a very agreea- 



