4 



178 Foreign Literature and Science. 



T 



4tb. Th^t of tlie Academy of Sciences : next to the imperi- 

 al Libraries, this is the most coiisiderahle, for it containg 

 60,000 volumes : among which are 3,000 in Chinese, 

 Blantschou and Tongutschou. It is rich also in Asiatic 

 manuscript?, in dran'ings of plants and butterflies, and in 

 other objects of natural history, coming from Madame Mer- 

 ian and Dr. FothergilU The Russian works to the num- 

 ber of 3,000 arc separate from the others. 5th. The Li- 

 brary of the Convent of Jfewski containing Sclavonic manu- 

 scripts, acts of councils, writings of the Getman philoso- 

 opher Wolfj and many theological treatises. 6th. The Li- 

 brary of the corps of Imperial Cadets : it has more than 

 ^ 12,000 volumes, and is annually increasing. 7th. The Li- 

 brary of the College of Medicine. 8th. That of the Econom- 

 ical Society. 9th. That of the University, lately founded 

 and which has alreadv 11,000 volumes. 



St. Petersburgh contains Besides more than twenty pri- 

 vate libraries, worthy of being mentioned as well for their 

 extent as for the rare and valuable works which they con- 

 tain ; sue!) are those of Counts Ischernichef, Schouvalof, 

 Ischeremetef, Strogonof, Youssoupof, Boutourlin, the late 

 princess Datschkof counsellor Betzkoi, of prince Koura- 

 kin, of Lieutenant General Klinger; the latter^posscsscs 

 the best collection of literary, historical, philosophical and 

 political works in English, French, German and Italian. 

 It contains a beautiful collection of autographic manu- 

 scripts of princes, officers, statesmen and learned men of 

 the different countries of Europe. This collection known 

 at first under the name of Doubrowski, is become imperial. 



Rev. Enc. 



14, Aurora Borealis. — A Royal Author. — The Ex-King 

 of Sweden (Colonel Gusfavson) has printed at Frankfort, 

 a memoir entitled, '' Reflections on the phenomena of the 

 Aurora Borealis and its relation to the diurnal motion." 

 It is written in French, and dedicated to the Royal Acade- 

 my of Sciences of Norway. The Aurora Borealis has been 

 ascribed to various causes, — by Mairan to the solar atmos- 

 phere,— by Lemonier to a matter which exhales from our 

 globe, and arises to a prodigious height in the atmosphere, 

 by Dr. Franklin and others to electricity — by Dalton and 

 Arrago to an e^^ci purely magnetic — this last opinion has 

 been generally adopted. Colonel Gustavson endeavours 



