1798.] 
the mufic of this piece was by LANGLES, 
a member of the confervatory. Lats and 
CHENARD fung. 
For fome time paft the court of Vienna 
has pafled a cenfure on a number of 
French publications, and prohibited their 
introduction and fale in the Auftrian ter- 
ritories. Inthe three months from April 
to July 1797, the total number of French 
books prohibited at Vienna, was one 
hundred and twenty-three, on different 
fubjects, politics, hiftory, the drama, ro- 
mance, biography, voyages, and even 
tranflaticns from the claflics; and from the 
Englifh, among cthers of the latter kiad, 
is the celebrated {fpeech of General Frrz- 
PATRICK, Dec. 16, 1796, inthe Britiib 
houfe of commons, in favour of La Fay- 
ETTE and his companions in mistortune, 
with the accompanying fpeeches of Melis. 
Pitt, Fox, SHERIDAN, &c. publithed 
in the French language at Namburgh. 
To avoid a dilagreeable collifon wiich 
has frequently taken place, when two 
perfons have been engaged at once in the 
tranflation of the fame work, the German 
bookfellers are at prefent in the pradctice of 
inferting in the literary journals, and 
efpecially that of Jena, a previous an- 
nouncement of the toreign books, tranila- 
tions of which thev propofe publishing. 
The literature of Germany, far fro.a de-. 
Spifing the works of their neighbours, 
rather ftudy to put them within the 
reach of their fellow countrymen, by 
publithing tranflations of them, very often 
accompanied with remarks and additions, 
which fometimes give to thefe tranfla- 
tions the airand merit of original works. 
The library of Pietro Metafafio, poet 
to the Imperial court of Vienna, who 
died in 1782, confifting of feveral thou- 
fand volumes, and particularly of iuperb 
editions of the elaflics, and which has 
hitherto been preferved by his heirs, has 
been lately purchafed by Dr. ALoysE 
OaRENO, for the king’s library at Lifbon. 
Arrangements are making tor forming 
a library inthe National Palace of the Ex- 
ecutive Directory. Citizen Pauissor is 
appointed conlervator. 
The armories of the fenate of Berne, 
together with the live bears kept in the 
follés of the city, ave either on the road 
to Paris, or have arrived thither, in or- 
gler to be\depolited in the mufeum of na- 
tural hiftory. 
The molt fkilful architeéts. of France 
are employed at prefant in devifing means 
to reftore and {trengthen the pillars of zhe 
~dome of the Pantheon, which are univer- 
ally allowed to be inadequate to fupport 
Foreign Literary Intelligence. — 459. 
the enormous mafs which depends wpon 
them. ‘The dangers to which this monu- 
ment, one of the neweft and mof magni- 
ficent in France, is expofed from this 
circumftance, are fuficient to call forth 
all the knowledge and all the refources of 
genius, of their ableft writers and pro- 
teffional men.. A number of fractures. 
have already taken place in the pillars of 
the dome and in the columns which adhere 
to them; the extreme weaknefs of thefe 
fupports is attributed to their little ca- 
pacity, and to the vicious form of their 
plan, which is triangular, Many men of 
merit are tor eatirely demolifhing this 
part of the editice, and for fubftituting a 
fimple and large rotunda, lighted upon 
the planof that over the Pantheon at 
Rome ; while athers oppofe this deftruc- 
tive advice, as a difpraceful barbarity in 
France to annihilate a domme, which, fay 
their writers, by its. magnificent eleva- 
tion takes the lead of all the monuments 
of this age; all, however, agree in the. 
indifpenfible neceflity of repairing and 
itrengthening thele fupports very f{peedily, 
and, if practicable, without altering any 
thing of the harmony and richnefs of or- 
dennance in the interior. It is fortunate 
that no new foundations are required for 
any propoied additions, however confi- 
derable, which may be made to the pil- 
lars; as Souflot, when he laid the foun- 
dations of this edifice, bya kind of pro- 
phetic genius, provided all the neceflary 
‘bafes for the reftoration of the fupports 
of his cupola. 
In a memoir lately read to the Philo- 
mathic Society at Paris, by Citizen 
GEOFFROY, proteffor of Zoology in the 
mufeum of natural hiftory, he confiders 
the {pecies of the animal, known at the 
Cape vf Good Hope by the name of co- 
cho de terre, and called by zoologifts 
myrimecophaga afra, oF capenjis, GMEL.a 
peculiar genus under the name of oryéfer- 
pus, as M. GEOFFROY proves, by a com- 
parifon of the organs of the ory¢teropus 
with thofe of the tatous dafipus, L. and 
of the myrmecophagi, that this genus is 
intermediate by its forms and habits, be- 
tween thofe two families. It approaches 
to the tatous in its organs -of maitication, 
and the term of the toes and nails, and 
in having a fkort and fingle caecum, 
whilft that of the myrmecophagi is dou- 
ble, as in birds, by the reuniting of the 
bones of the os pubis, which are not arti- 
-culated together in. the myrmecophagi. 
The oryéteropus, however, bears a rela- 
tion to the laft, fince it has; like them, a 
very {mall mouth, whence its tongue co- 
; vered 



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