CRITICAL NOTICES OF NEW PUBLICATIONS. 273 



present state of geological science ; its facts are brought out clearly and 

 Broadly, without reference or leaning to any particular theory. But its 

 theories are also ably discussed in the Introduction, and in an Appendix 

 added by the translator. This arrangement appears particularly judi- 

 cious in a science which, although still in its infancy, has experienced so 

 many revolutions ; for while we have in the body of the work, as far as 

 a book can form a substitute for the study of the actual phenomena, its 

 facts plainly and succinctly laid before us, unencumbered by theory, 

 we may also benefit by the deductions of those who have preceded us in 

 our labours, by consulting the commencement and concluding part of 

 the volume. 



We present our readers with a short extract, but strongly recommend 

 the perusal of the entire work : — 



" Bones of fossil elephants have been found, at all times ; but, till lately, the 

 nature of these bones was always misunderstood. It is to the discovery of them, 

 that we owe the fabulous histories of the digging up of the bodies of ancient 

 giants ; for, at a period when anatomy had made so little progress, the lore of the 

 marvellous could so much the more readily seize such events, to accredit the ideas 

 ■which affect the imagination ; as the elephant is (except as to size) one of the 

 animals whose skeleton presents the most resemblance to that of man. An entire 

 volume would be taken up in detailing the accounts of fossil bones of great quad- 

 rupeds, which ignorance, or fraud, have represented to be the remains of human 

 giants. The most celebrated of all, is that of the skeleton which, in Louis the 

 Xlllth's reign, was pretended to be that of Teutobothus, King of the Cimbri, who 

 fought against Marius. The following are the circumstances which gave rise to 

 this tale : — 



** On the 11th of January, 1613, in a sand-pit, near the Chateau de Chaumon, 

 between the towns of Montricoux, Serres, and Saint Antoine, some bones were 

 found, several of which were broken by the workmen. A surgeon of Beaurepaire, 

 named Mazurier, informed of this discovery, possessed himself of the bones, and 

 contrived how to turn them to good account. He gave out that he had found them 

 in a sepulchre thirty feet in length, upon which were incribed the words Teutobochus 

 Rex. He added, tliat, at the same time time, he found fifty medals, bearing the 

 head of Marius. He inserted these stories in a pamphlet, by means of which the 

 curiosity of the public being aroused, he exhibited, for money, the bones of the 

 pretended giant, as well at Paris as in other cities. Gassendi names a Jesuit of 

 Tournon, as the author of the pamphlet, and proves, that the pretended antique 

 medals were fabricated ; as to the bones, they were those of an elephant." 



The Works of William Cowper ; his Life and Letters by Wm. Hayley, 

 Esq. now first completed by the introduction of Cowper's Private 

 Correspondence. Edited by the Rev. T. S. Grimshawe, A.M. 

 Vols. L and II. London : Saunders and Otley. 



Hayley's Life of Cowper is familiar to most reading men, but it has 

 never been considered a perfect work. His mind, however literary and 

 elegant, was not precisely qualified to present a religious character to the 

 view of the British public ; we are not surprised, therefore, that his 

 reflections should be occasionally misplaced and injudicious. In his 

 anxiety to refrain from exhibiting Cowper too prominently in a religious 

 garb, he has ingrafted defects, and rendered his work faulty and incom- 

 plete. The termination of the copyright of Hayley's Life of Cowper, 

 and sole and undisputed access to the private correspondence collected 

 by Dr. Johnson, it appears, has enabled the editor to present, for the 

 first time, such a complete edition of the entire works of the author of 

 ** The Task'^ as no other person can hope to accomplish, because all 

 others are debarred from the sources of his exclusive derivation. Up- 

 wards of two hundred letters are thus incorporated with the former work 

 of Hayley in their due and chronological order ; and the merits of this 

 private correspondence are attested in a letter addressed to Dr. Johnson, 

 by that distinguished literary judge the late Rev. Robert Hall, of which 

 the following is an extract : — ** I have always considered the letters of 



