412 Notices of Recent and 
5. Guy’s Pocket Cyclopedia or Epitome of Universal Knowl- 
edge, designed for Senior Scholars in Schools, and for young persons 
in general ; by Joseph Guy. Ninth edition, enlarged and extensive- 
ly improved: London, pp. 633, 12mo. 
The Quebec Lnterary and Historical Society has just published 
the first volume of its transactions. This Society has grown up un- 
der the munificent patronage of the Earl of Dalhousie, and has ably 
commenced its career : it has a wide range for objects of inquiry and 
research, and we shall expect from it much useful information. 
The following is from the Quebec Official Gazette. 
“The first volume of the ‘ Transactions of the Literary and His- 
torical Society’ is now published and for sale. They form a good 
sized octavo volume of 260 pages, exclusive of the Catalogue of the 
Mineralogical Collection belonging to the Society, which contains 72 
pages, and of several maps and lithographic prints. 
= first article is the Inaugural Address, being an essay on ae 
Juridical History of France, antecedent to the year 1663, when the 
Sovereign Council of Quebec was established, the Law, as it was then 
administered being the common Law of Lower Canada. ‘This arti- 
cle was written by the Chief Justice, and is a luminous and classical 
digest of the legal system of the Province, ending with a strong re- 
commendation of the necessity of some establishment of a public de- 
‘scription, where Law might be taught as a science. The recent de- 
cision on the subject of M’Gill College affords ground for hoping that 
this desideratum may hereafter be supplied. 
“The seeond article is from the pen of Captain Bayfield, R. N. 
‘and contains outlines of the Geology of Lake Superior. This paper 
-would, from its intrinsic merit, have attracted observation in the moth- 
er country, rich as she is in every kind of literature. An article, by 
- Mr. Green, follows, respecting coloring materials produced in Cana- 
da. This paper was communicated to the Society of Arts, London, 
with some specimens of the raw and the prepared materials, and that 
Society was pleased to award to the writer the gold Isis medal. 
“The next is an account of some meteorological phenomena ob- 
served in Canada by Captain Bonnycastle, R. E. who has also sup- 
plied a second article on a few of the Rocks and Minerals of Upper 
Canada. Mr. A. Stewart has furnished two very interesting papers, 
ee eee Sed Aer me ae Se 
