Notices respecting New Books. 65 
The proof consists of first filling the boiler with water, and then 
Joading the safety-valve to any point required; then injecting 
water by a forcing pump, till the safety-valve, with the additional 
weight upon it, is raised. , 
Have you any other suggestions to make on the subject of the 
safety of steam-engines, besides what you have already said ?— 
I think not. : 
IX. Notices respecting New Books. 
An Inquiry into the progressive Colonization of the Earth, and 
the Origin of Nations ; illustrated ly a Map of the Geo- 
graphy of Ecclesiastical and Ancient Civil History. By 
 'T. Hemine, of Magdalen Hall, Oxon. 
W: have read this work with attention, and examined the 
large map, with which it is accompanied, with some degree of 
care. The whole exhibits much patient, and, when the nature 
of the inquiry is considered, we may add successful investigation. 
The title of the work expresses sufficiently its object. How- 
ever serviceable detached ‘‘scraps of chorography,” embodied 
under the name of “ an atlas,’’ may be to those who have al- 
ready attained proficiency in the scieuce, there is great incon- 
venience in being obliged, while reading, to turn from one de- 
tached survey to another, and so to combine them as to obtain 
satisfaction. To obviate this, “and to facilitate by the most 
approved mode the acquirement of correct ideas, regarding the 
circulation of human societies through the remotest periods, it 
was designed to compass, in a general map, the whole scope of 
territory connected with the sacred, civil, and profane writings 
of antiquity, on such a competent scale as appeared sufficient 
for every requisite illustration, from the first colonial migrations 
of maukind, to the rise of the present nations of the earth, and © 
still to confine the same within such a dimension, as might ren- 
der it convenient for the most ordinary and general application 
and reference.” 
But the author had first to settle his point of departure—the 
second cradle of the human race. For this purpose the tradi- 
tions, for they deserve not the name of records, of the Egyptians, 
the Assyrians, the Chinese, the Pheenicians, the Scythians, the 
Indians, the Persians, and Arabians; and the writings of Ho- 
mer, Hesiod, Thales, Pythagoras, Plato, Hecateus, Berosus, 
Abydenus, Alexander Polyhistor, Demetrius, Diodorus Siculus,&e. 
are examined, and compared with the writings of the Jewish 
law-giver. This subject occupies the author’s first chapter, which ° 
he concludes with the following deductions: 
Vol. 50. No, 231. July 1817. po “ First— 
