1839-1 new Tenasserim Coal Field. 393 



than any other railway ; in requiring no levelling or road-making ; in adapting itself to 

 all situations, as it may be constructed on the side of any public road on the waste and 

 irregular margins, on the beach or shingles of the sea-shore, — indeed, where no other 

 road can be made ; in the original cost being much less, and the impediments and 

 great expense occasioned by repairs in the ordinary mode, being by this method al- 

 most avoided. 



" A line of railway on this principle was erected, in 1825, at Cheshunt, in Hertford- 

 shire, chiefly for conveying bricks from that town, across the marshes, for shipment in 

 the river Lea. The posts which support the rails are about ten feet apart, and vary in 

 their height from two to five feet, according to the undulations of the surface, and 

 so as to preserve a continuous horizontal line to the rail. The- posts were made of 

 sound pieces of old oak, ship timber, and in a, the slot or cleft at the upper ends of the 

 posts, are fixed deal planks twelve inches by three, set in edgeways, and covered 

 with a thin bar of iron, about four inches wide, flat on its under side, and very slightly 

 rounded on its upper side ; the true plane of the rail being regulated or preserved 

 by the action of counter wedges between the bottom of the mortices, and that of the 

 planks. By this rail, on the level, one horse seemed to be capable of drawing at 

 the usual pace about fourteen tons, including the carriages. 



" The late Mr. Tredgold, whose opinion in matters of this nature will ever be 

 entitled to attentive consideration, expressed himself very favourably to this invention 

 in his Treatise on Railroads and Carriages : — " We expect (he observed) that this 

 single railroad will be found far superior to any other for the conveyance of the mails, 

 and those light carriages of which speed is the principal object; because we are 

 satisfied that a road for such carriages must be raised so as to be free from the in- 

 terruptions and crossings of an ordinary railway." 



Art. VI. — Memoria sul Renascimento e stato atticale della Medicina 



in Egitto, del D. G. E. Mino. 

 Memoir on the Regeneration and actual state of Medicine in Egypt — 



Translated from the Italian of J. E. Mino, Doctor in Philosophy, 



Medicine, and Surgery. Leghorn, 1838. 



(For the Journal of the Asiatic Society.) 



We are indebted to Mr. W. H. Cameron for a copy of Dr. Mino's pamphlet, which 

 was printed in Europe for private circulation, and contains many details worthy the 

 close attention of all who take interest in the progress of general as well as Medical 

 education. 



Dr. Mino's essay affords full evidence of the failure of Clot Bey's system for the in- 

 troduction of Medical science into Egypt. The causes of the failure are moreover 

 explicitly and palpably exhibited. There was no penury of means, no paucity of 

 teachers ; all that the most princely munificence could place at the Bey's disposal he 

 was permitted to command without controul. Still the tree produced no fruits, and 

 this simply, because it was planted at the wrong end. They commenced where they 

 should have terminated ; namely, by the erection 6f a School taught in the vernacular 

 language. It is difficult to conceive a more ludicrous attempt than that to teach me- 



