66 Literary and Critical Proémium. 
vested in the parties by the legislature, to the 
extent of excluding all other modes for the 
improyed transit of goods. In p. 65, &e. 
is drawn a line of distinction between 
these much-wanted Rail-ways, and the 
host of London bubbles, concocted in 
Change-alley, for Rail-ways where none 
are wanted. Of the nineteen public Rail- 
ways enumerated in p. 69, and the pri- 
vate ones previously alluded to by Mr. P. 
as amounting together to several thousand 
miles, in length, of Rail-road, we fully be- 
lieve, that not one mile of these has yet 
been used for the public conveyance of 
goods and general merchandise. They ex- 
clusively serve to transport coals and stone, 
and such-like articles, and are yet untried 
for general purposes. It behoves, therefore, 
these two Companies, well to weigh, and 
by judicious arrangements, to obviate the 
objections, which hitherto have prevented 
the general use of a Rail-way. 
Beauties of Ancient English and Scottish 
History, in 1 vol. 8vo., by Caroline Maxwell : 
—This lady presents us there with another 
volume of selections; and we think with 
still more success than in her ‘‘ Beauties 
of Ancient Eloquence.” She has a wider 
field of interest, to glean from, than her 
former subject afforded. The present work 
will be found a valuable acquisition to the 
libraries of young people, and of general 
utility, as a book of reference, to all. 
The Love Letters of Mary Queen of Scots, 
to James Earl of Bothwell ; with her Love 
Sonnets and Marriage Contracts (being the 
long-missing originals from the gilt casket, ) 
explained by State Papers, &c. &c. &:c. By 
Hugh Campbell, LL.D., F.A.S-, Illustrator of 
Ossian’s Poems: — Among the bitterest per- 
secutors (calumniators, perhaps, we might 
have said,) of the memory of this unfortu- 
nate Queen, Dr. Campbell now steps for- 
ward with a collection of pretended love 
letters—which escaped it seems even the 
prying malice and intriguing diligence of 
‘Elizabeth and Murray; but which he en- 
deavours to foist upon us with a cock and 
a bull story, which few, even of those to 
whom his English may be intelligible,* will 
be able to understand, and fewer still to 
believe. Indeed, Dr. C. seems himself 
to be aware of the deficiency of the his- 
torical testimony, and, therefore, thinks to 
rest the claim of his letters to authenticity 
on their ‘‘ internal evidence.”’* And what 
does this internal evidence amount to? 
Why the style of the language appears to be 
old Scotch modernised to the reignt of the 
* Take one specimen out of a multitude which 
might be produced of Dr. C.’s new modes of An- 
.glicism. Pref. p. xii. 
«© To many readers of good sense and fine feelings, 
the nature of the subject now treated of will, I fear, 
place me before them as an opponent of Queen Mary.” 
—Place me before to them, would appear a strange 
sort of English, if LL. D., F. A. S. were not added 
to the name of the author. 
t Old Scotch modernised to a reign!!! 
this is the identical english of the 
himself. 
Reader 
L. D., F. A. S. 
[Feb. I, 
second Charles; while Mary Queen of Scots 
never wrote in Scotch, and assuredly not 
in Scotch modernised to the reign (or to 
the style used in the reign) of the second 
Charles : —they must, therefore, be genuine. 
originals!!! Really the acuteness of the 
logic of this LL. D., F.A.S., is equal to the 
manliness of his sentiments,* and the accu- 
racy of his English style. Upon such eyvi- 
dence, however, we are here presented 
with eleven letters, in which Mary is made 
the avower and recorder of an adulterous 
intercourse with Bothwell, and of a parti- 
cipation, by previous knowledge of the de- 
sign, in the murder of her husband. 
ooh Ae 
FOREIGN LITERATURE. 
NETHERLANDS. 
Among the most interesting recent pub- 
lications are, Nova Acta Litleraria Societatio 
Rheno-Trajectine. Memoirs of the Literary 
Society of Utrecht. A Critical History of 
Sophists from the time of Socrates ; by J. Grel. 
- FRANCE. ‘ 
Of the publications of the preceding 
month, we shall only mention, at present, 
Dictionnaire des Sciences Naturelles, by se- 
veral professors of the Jardin du Roi, and 
of the principal schools of Paris. This 
work treats, principally, of animal biography 
and the productions of the earth. —Recher- 
ches sur les Ossemens fossiles,—in which the 
character of many animals, whose species 
have been destroyed by natural revolutions, 
is discovered. Nouvel Almanach des Gour- 
mands, beinga guide to the art of good living, 
dedicated to the belly; by A. B. de Perigord, 
and comprising Poesies Gourmandes. dn- 
nales du Musée et de Ecole moderne des 
beaux Arts; an entier collection of engrav- 
ings from the paintings and sculptures of the 
Musée Royale, and a selection from the 
galleries of Versailles, the Luxembourg, &c. 
GERMANY. 
Dr. J. Frederic Kleuker has published a 
work, “ Ueber den alten und neun Protes- 
tantism.”* The Protestant Religion as at first , 
established, and now exercised. 
SWITZERLAND. 
M. Jean Hanhart, has published Conrad 
Gessner ; Ein Beytrag sur Geschichte, &c. 
The Life of Conrad Gessner (by Jean Han- 
hart,) from original documents, forming an 
exemplification of the state of Literature and 
the 
* Dr. C. seems to have a generous pride in record- 
ing and imagining all the evil that can be scraped 
together or suggested relative to the sex whom it 
was once thought to be manly and gentleman-liketo . 
epelagice for and protect ; and, as another specimen 
of the analytical acuteness of his superlative logic, we 
are told that we ought to believe Mary Queen of Scets 
capable of being a common adultress, and accessary 
to the murder of her husband; because a farmer's 
wife was lately executed for instigating her paramour 
to a like murder, and because Dr. C. has heard a 
report which loads the memory of England’s Injured 
Queen, with more offences t! even the conductors 
of acertain state inquisition attempted to heap bi 
her. From such a persevering assailant of all that 
bears the name of woman, even the moral character 
of Queen Elizabeth (announced as the next subject 
of the Dr.’s animadversions) has little to apprehend. 
Se 
