tae i a 
“eee 
‘ 
-1825.] 
communication; who, with perfect apathy to sci- 
ence, habitually sufier the most interesting facts to 
pass through their notice into oblivion. Hence, if 
“not in surgery, it has happened, at all events, in 
medicine, that almost every improvement has been 
promulgated by men who had only the scanty op- 
portunities of private practice. This is not extra- 
ordinary in a profession, where genius is only a mark 
for envy and persecution, and any other than me- 
diocrity, with worldly craft, rarely successful. 
We may venture to assure Mr. Fos- 
brooke, that it is not to js profession only 
that this observation will apply. 
The Botanic Garden, or Magazine of 
Hardy Flower Plants cultivated in Great 
Britain. By B. Maun. Small 4to.—Nos. 1, 
2, 3, 4, 5, 6, '7, 8, and 9, containing four co- 
loured figures each, with their scientific and 
English names; the Linnzan class and or- 
der, and Jussieuean natural order to which 
they belong; their native country ; date of 
introduction, or known cultivation; height ; 
time of flowering, and duration—whether 
annual, biennial, or perennial ; the medical 
or other qualities of such as are used in 
pharmacy, domestic practice, or the arts ; 
the most approved mode of prapagation and 
culture; and reference to a botanical de- 
scription of each plant; together with no- 
tices of many physiological phenomena ob- 
served in this beautiful part of the creation. 
This unostentatious monthly publication is 
neatly executed, and from the moderate 
price at which it is issued (small paper, one 
shilling ; larger paper, one shilling and six- 
pence per number), and the information it 
contains, will be acceptable to the generality 
of the lovers of botany. 
The Orlando Furioso of Ludovico Ariosto, 
adapted to the perusal of Youth by Gtoac- 
cuino Avesant, &c. London, 3 vols. 12mo. 
—The poem of the Orlando Furioso has no 
need of eulogy. Translated into the prin- 
cipal languages of Europe, it is well known 
to all lovers of literature. The Abbot 
Avesani has undertaken to purify it from 
those licentious passages, on account of 
which, all who respect morality, were 
obliged to withhold this book from the 
hands of youth. He has accomplished this, 
task with judgment ; and, in this respect, 
deserves considerable praise. The edition 
which has been republished by Treuttel and 
Wiirtz in London, is also valuable for the 
aecents placed over the words, in the correct 
pronunciation of which, those who have not 
been educated in Italy, often fall into error. 
_ The poem is preceded by a life of Ariosto, 
but we do not think in what will be con- 
sidered as the purest Italian. On the con- 
trary, it is interspersed with several galli- 
cisms. It is, however, in other respects, 
written in a simple and unaffected style, in- 
which, if there Js little to praise, there is 
nothing, to, censure, 
__ Each volume: contains notes at the end, 
which are sometimes usefal, but often super- 
fluous and’ puerile.’ For instance, particu- 
lar care is takeit to inform the reader that 
Doiiestic and Foreign. 
349 
Vulcan was the forger of the thunderbolts ; 
that Ganymede was carried off by Joye ; 
that Megera was one of the three Furies ; 
that the Sirens were daughters of the riyer 
Achelous ; that Antzus and Briareusavere 
two giants; that Sappho and Corinna were 
two poetesses. It is equally curious to see 
an edition of the Orlando Furioso, pub- 
lished in the country of Pinkerton and of 
Guthrie, enriched with such new geogra- 
phical explanations—as, for an example, that 
Morocco is in Africa; that Thebes, Argos, 
and Mycene were three ,cities of Greece; 
that the Pyrenees are mountains which se- 
parate Spain from France; and above all, 
that woody Caledonia is in Scotland, and 
that England is called Albion, because its 
surrounding shores appear white to the dis- 
tant navigator. 
Thoughts on an illustrious Evile; occa- 
sioned by the Persecution of the Protestants in 
1815; with other Poems. By Hucu Stuart 
Boyp, Esq. 8vo.—Our eye had no sooner 
glanced upon the title-page of this thin vo- 
lume, than our hopes of any thing pertain- 
ing to the higher order of poetry vanished. 
Some good sense, conyeyed in smooth versi- 
fication, perhaps we might meet with; but 
Thoughts on an, &e. are syllables that 
would not have been strung together, even 
in a title-page, by any one who had a true 
poetic feeling of his subject. We proceeded 
to the Preface, and our hopes of any tempe- 
rance of judgment, any liberal sympatliy or 
enlightened view of the argument, vanished 
also. We found this hater of Protestant 
persecution—this compassionater of the 
treatment (to this country, we confess, sufti- 
ciently disgraceful) of the Illustrious Exile, 
was himself a rancorous (wwe ‘will leave it to 
the author himself to shew whether we 
might not haye added, a scurrilous) bigot, 
filled full to overflowing, of the exquisite 
rancour of theological hatred. The perse- 
cutions of the Protestants in France, shortly 
after the restoration of the Bourbons, were 
sufficiently disgraceful to the Bourbon 
priests who excited, and the Bourbon go- 
vernment that did not at once check’ and 
punish them. But how much better would. 
the Catholics be likely to be treated, if in 
his power, by the polemic, who after talking 
of “the quacks who drugged the Rhemish 
Testament” (alluding to a recent Catholie 
translation), and calling them ‘ facetious 
mountebanks,”’ proceeds to such sentences 
as these: 
«© I am therefore willing to believe, that in the 
present instance, these blociheads sinned more from 
ignorance than knavery. But what are we to think 
of the Vicars Apostolic, Titular Bishops, and other 
Rulers of the Roman Church, who, from their spir 
‘ritual cook-shop in Duke Street; still ladle forth this 
miserable trash ?”’—** The Popish Version is as fulse 
as Hell! and our trauslation is as pure and unsullicd 
as the light of Heaven ! !” ye ih My ee ia 
He tells us ina note, amongother things, 
that “whether the Papists did or, did-not 
set fire to London” is still a “ matter of 
uncertainty.” 
