4799-1] 
number of fmall tables and chairs, fo, that 
more than an hundred bookfellers may 
place thenifelves two and two to arrange 
their bufinefs. Here they treat for ex- 
changes of books, or taking them on com- 
miffion ; or, in finey any bufinefS rela~ 
tive to the fale. of books., When the 
bookfellers return to their refpective a- 
bodes, they reprint their © catalogues, , 
to announce the new publication “they 
have brought home with them. — Li- 
-terature feems to receive an electrical 
fhock, and to be renovated at thefe pe- 
sides where a circumftantial account of 
the itate of letters may be eafily procured. 
The catalogue of the laft fair furnifhed 
not lefs chan three thoufand new books, 
and a hundred new ‘pieces of mpfic; ex- 
clufive of foreign publications, which oc- 
cupy a place apart in the catalogue. No- 
vels and theatrical pieces amounted to. 
more than three hundred; but the former 
were more than four times. the number of 
the latter. Many of thefe new produétions 
were of little value, and we were too often 
deceived with titles. There were fome con- 
tinuations of excellent works; but as to 
publications entirely new, there were not 
many diitinguifhed for originality, tafte, 
or ufefulnefs. 
CuHarLeEs de ECKHARTSHAUZEN, au- 
lic counftllor to the Elector of Bavaria, at 
Munich, has difcovered the fecret of pro- 
ducing falt- -petre by an artificial procefs. 
His invention has been examined by a 
committee appointed by the Elector, who 
have declared his falt-petre to be applica- 
ble ‘to all the purpofes for which this arti- 
cle, as produced by nature in the common 
way, can be uled; in confequence of 
which he has obtained a patent for ereét- 
ing a manufactory and fome powder- 
mills. ; 
Dipor, the celebrated bookfeller and 
’ printer at Paris, has advertifed a new 
folio edition of Racine’s works. It will 
be printed with all poffible typographic 
{plendour, and fold to fub{cribers for 1200 
lives, 
On the morning of the 24th of Novem- 
ber the moon will, mie vat eh. 24 m. and 
at 4h. 44m. fhe will begin to eclipfe the 
refulgent planet Venus ; and at 3i.m. patt 
5 the eclipfe will end. 
ment of this occultation Venus appears 
13m, fouth of the mcoon’s centre; and at 
the end 4im. north. This phenomenon 
wil) appear the more beautiful on account 
Li fo {mall a part of the moon’s difk being 
Uluminated at that’ time. 
According to the lateft ebfervations the 
datitude of Hamburgh i 19°53" 44.-9a-aand 
33 
Z 
Literary and Philofophical Intelligencz..’ « 
At the commence- | 
Bog 
the longitude 27° a9/; the latitude of 
Helgoland 54° 11’ 26", and the longitude 
26°31! 15". De Lambre, after having 
made 1700 obfervations, ftates the lati- 
tude of Paris tobe 48° 50’ 14”. Quenot, 
one of the aftronomers who went with 
Buonaparte to Egypt, found, after re- 
peated obfervations, that the longitude of 
Alexandria is == 1° 50! 2.3" ; Buache has 
found the fame Tefult, after having com- 
pared the journals of feveral fhips which 
failed from Candia and Malta to Alex 
andria. According to Chazelles’s obfer- 
vations, made in Egypt, and computed 
after De Lambre’s tables, the longitude of 
Carn isha en .6'% Quenot found the lon- 
gitude of Corfu to Be'17° 57/5 Beauchamp 
17° 51 ; thelatitudeof Raguja 42° 36: (30, » 
and the longitude 14, 51° 40”. 
Alex. won Humboldt obferved, that the 
miclination of the needle is at Madrid 
67° 40.48"... At! Alexandria, in Egypt, 
the inclination of the needle was found to 
be 47° 5%, and. the declination 130 6’. 
According to the lateft obfervations, the 
inclination of the needle at Manele is 
65° 9! 36°, and the declination 20° 55’ 305 
at ieee the inclination is 69° 28 48”, 
The two celebrated French chemifts’ 
Ha Hopaian and Fourcroy,, have re- 
peated, laft winter at Paris, the experi- 
ments of Lowirz on artificial cold, 
When the natural cold was at the higheft 
‘degree, they mixed eight parts of muriat 
of time with fix parts of loofe fhow, and 
by. that mixture produced an incalculable 
degree of cold; 2o0lb. of mercury froze en- 
tirely 5 fpirits “of wine, ether, and diftilled 
vinegar of wine, froze in 30 feconds. The 
extremity of the finger being dipped in 
that mixture, loft all fenfation in. 4 fe- 
conds. Aijl fubftances which were put in_ 
that mixture froze in 30 feconds, in a cru- 
cible of Platina; and in two minutes in 
china and earthen crucibles. Brandy 
which was expofed to the air, December 
26, began to'freeze after two minutes. 
The National Inftitute at Paris offers a 
prize of a kilogram in gold (3400 livres), 
for the bet calculation of the: famous 
comet of 1770, Theaftronomers hitherto 
have attempted in vain to make the obfer- 
vations of that comet agree with the laws 
of the parabolic motion. Levell has re- 
prefented thefe obfervations in an elliptical 
courfe which it muft defcribe in 53 years. 
However, as that comet appeared neither 
before nor after the year 1770, {uch a rapid 
circumvolution feems to be utterly inad- 
miffible. 
» The prefent refarmation of meafures in 
France is. not originally owing to the re- 
volutionary 
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