Notices respecting New Books. 455 
The Eighth Number (which completes the second volume) of 
The Memoirs of the Caledonian Horticultural Society has just 
been published. Contents : 
History.— Discourse by Dr. Duncan senior, read 4th De- 
cember 1$15—Discourse by the same, read 3d December 1816. 
Memoirs—Report ef the Committee for Experiments on the 
Naturalization of Useful and Ornamental Plants under the Cli- 
mate of Scotland ; with Prefatory Remarks on the Character and 
Economical Uses of Forest Trees, already introduced, and an 
Enumeration of certain Exotic Plants which have lately with- 
stood the Winter of North Britain; drawn up by John Yule, 
M.D.F.R.S.E. —Mr.Wales’s Account of an easy and sure Method 
of raising Mushrooms, either with Dung or without it. 
Dr. MacLean has just published a very interesting work on 
Epidemic and Pestilential Diseases ; the principal doctrine of 
which is, that the cause of epidemics resides in the qualities of 
the air; in this respect it is correspondent to the doctrine of a 
small tract just published by Mr. Thomas Forster, on Atmo- 
spherical Diseases. Dr. MacLean, however, has entered very 
minutely into the erroneousness of the geueral practice in these 
kind of disorders, and has shown in a masterly manner, that the 
practice now prevalent is not only useless, but is the principal 
cause why such a number of people are every year carried off 
by the plague and other epidemics. One of the most curious 
facts mentioned by Dr. MacLean is, that the doctrine concerning 
contagion owes its origin to a Catholic stratagem in the middle 
of the sixteenth century, whereby an endeavour was made by the 
Legates of Pope Paul III. to remove the Council of Trent to Bo- 
logna, by spreading a report that an epidemic disease then pre- 
valent at Trent was infectious. His observations on quarantine 
are highly deserving the notice of all who have the direction of 
medical police. —_——— 
A Synoptical Catalogue of British Birds has been published 
by Messrs. Nicholls and Co. intended to identify the species 
spoken of by different provincial names in various counties of 
Great Britain. It contains also the valuable additions and ge- 
neric arrangement of Dr. Leach, from a Catalogue he recently 
printed. 
Mr. Abernethy has just published his Third Course of Lectures_ 
at the London College of Surgéons, on Mr. Hunter’s Theory of 
Life, and on his Myseum. ° It appears that many of the most 
important discoveries assumed by recent physiologists have been 
plagiarized from that celebrated surgeon. 
~ 
Mr. W. J. Hooker and Dr. Taylor have just pudlished a work 
on the Mosses of Great Britain and Ireland, entitled ‘* Musco- 
Ffr4 . 4 logia 
